Habs deal blow to Islanders’ playoff hopes
Suddenly hot Canadiens enjoying life on the road as they stretch unbeaten streak to five games
MONTREAL — Jonathan Drouin and Nikita Scherbak scored in the second period as the Montreal Canadiens earned at least a point in a fifth straight game with a 3-1 victory over the New York Islanders on Wednesday night.
Paul Byron also scored for the Canadiens (24-29-10), who are 2-0-3 in their last five outings.
Mathew Barzal scored his 18th of the season for the Islanders (29-28-7), who are winless in their last four games and 4-8-2 in their last 14.
Shots were 28-26 in New York’s favour. It was wide open hockey in the first period, with teams trading chances and each coming up with a goal. The highlight was the Islanders getting three breakaways while killing a penalty, although they failed to score on them.
Barzal turned on the jets to take a pass at the Montreal blue line, blow past rookie defenceman Noah Juulsen and beat Antti Niemi with a backhand deke at 3:50.
Drouin stole a puck at the Islanders’ blue line and slipped it to Artturi Lehkonen behind the net for a feed to Byron in the slot and a shot to the top corner past Jaroslav Halak.
Drouin moved into the left circle to take a feed from Jeff Petry and put a shot inside the far post on a power play 8:29 into the second period.
Scherbak trailed in on a play and saw his one-timer of a Brendan Gallagher pass trickle through Halak’s pads for his second goal in 10 games this season.
Canadiens coach Claude Julien said goalie Carey Price, who is recovering from a concussion, will not accompany the team for the rematch in New York on Friday night. but may join the team at some point in the six-game road trip.
Sabres 2, Lightning 1
At Tampa, Fla., Jason Pominville scored on a power play at 1:26 of overtime to give the Buffalo Sabres a victory over the NHL-leading Lightning.
Pominville beat Andrei Vasilevskiy with a one-timer from the left circle to give the Sabres their second straight victory over the Bolts.
Evan Rodrigues tied it for Buffalo in the third.
Cory Conacher scored for Tampa Bay. With a point in the standings for the overtime loss, the Lightning became the first team to reach 90 points this season.
— With files from the Associated Press