TIME TO MOVE ON FOR HABS
Heading west after bad loss to Pens
Chants of “Ca-rey, Ca-rey” rang through the Bell Centre Saturday night as Carey Price stopped breakaways and twisted his body in ways that wouldn’t have seemed out of place in the Cirque du Soleil.
Unfortunately for the Canadiens, most of the heroics came after the Pittsburgh Penguins scored three goals on their first four shots en route to a 5-1 win over the Canadiens.
The Canadiens have shown an ability to come back this season, but they found themselves in too deep a hole and, while Matt Murray wasn’t as spectacular as Price, he turned in a solid performance as he limited Montreal to one goal on 37 shots. He stopped Max Domi and Paul Byron on breakaways, but Montreal made it easy for him.
The Montreal power play once again came up empty, going 0-for-3. Montreal had 20 shots that were off target and 20 more were blocked. The power play has scored one goal in 24 opportunities over the past 10 games.
“We were playing a good team,” said Brendan Gallagher, who scored his 29th goal. “We pushed back. We had some breakaways and we hit a post but they tightened up and it was a big win for them and a bad loss for us.
“But you move on. You can’t feel sorry for yourself. We didn’t get the result, but we go to Los Angeles and try to change that.”
This game had a direct impact on the playoff race in the Eastern Conference. Pittsburgh pulled even with Montreal on points with 77, but the Penguins get the first wild-card spot because they have played one fewer game. The Canadiens, meanwhile, have to be worried about Columbus. The Blue Jackets lost to the Jets Sunday but remain only two points back with one game in hand.
“If we were able to get one more goal, it might have made a difference, but when they went ahead 4-0, that made it difficult,” Gallagher said.
“If we could have scored two, we might have had a chance.”
Gallagher said the high skill level of the Penguins made them dangerous.
“You look at who scored the goals tonight — (Sidney) Crosby, (Evgeni) Malkin and (Jake) Guentzel. They’re pretty good goal scorers and when the puck’s on their sticks and you give them the opportunity, it’s pretty hard to stop them.”
The Canadiens rebounded from a slow start Friday to beat the Rangers, but coach Claude Julien said this wasn’t similar.
“I don’t know if it was that slow If you take away the goals,” said Julien.
“We made mistakes early on. On the first shift, we gave up a goal and then they scored off a faceoff. We thought we had energy in the first period. We had lots of chances in the second and we should have scored another goal or two.”
The Canadiens outshot the Penguins 15-5 in the third period when Pittsburgh went into full defensive mode.
“(The Penguins) played a smart third period,” said Julien. “They were throwing pucks out so we didn’t spend too much time in their end.”
Phillip Danault, who set up Gallagher for his goal, put a shot off a post in the third period.
“That pretty well summed up the whole game,” said Danault. “We didn’t get the bounces tonight.”