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The Montreal Canadiens are heading to the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs. In a bizarre turn of events, the Canadiens didn’t even muster double digits in shots, but beat the Tampa Bay Lightning 2-1 to win Game 7. The Habs will now head to Buffalo to face the Sabres in Game 1 on Wednesday night.
Wilde HorsesIt took seven games, but Nick Suzuki finally got the goal he needed these playoffs. Suzuki has played well, but the goals just haven’t come. He was actually tied with Lane Hutson for the team lead in points in the series with six, but a goal was elusive. Most of the series, he was eating minutes trying to contain some of the best players in the world.
The goal came thanks to hard work down low from Cole Caufield and Josh Anderson to win the opportunity to feed Kaiden Guhle. He simply fired it toward the goal, where Suzuki deflected it off JJ Moser and into the net.
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Hockey is bizarre because earlier in the period, Juraj Slafkovsky had a picture-perfect shot go off the crossbar and wide. All of the excellent opportunities to score in the last two games that refused to go in, then a pinball event leads to Montreal taking a 1-0 lead.
The first period showed that Noah Dobson was fine in every aspect of the game as he played his first hockey of the series. Dobson recovered from a thumb injury in 22 days. It’s presumed that it was a thumb fracture, as that is the absolute fastest that an athlete can return from this injury, which usually takes five weeks.
Desperate times called for Dobson to return and when he wired a shot in the first period, it was clear that he was ready to go. Dobson helped to solidify the defence. Dobson and Hutson were a pair the Canadiens would have loved for seven games.
The Canadiens played a tight opening period with a high awareness to not allow any easy chances. They had one odd-man rush against them that looked dangerous, but Slafkovsky’s awareness was outstanding as he hustled back to break up the play as a trailer.
Things started to get lopsided in the second period as the Lightning looked for the equalizer. It was their biggest push. They ran into goaltender Jakub Dobes, who was feeling confident. Brandon Hagel took a point-blank shot and Dobes flashed the glove hand confidently. It was the look of a goaltender who was feeling it. Halfway through the game, the shots were 18-4 Lightning.
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The Canadiens went almost 27 minutes without a shot, but a shift midway through the third period sparked them. The Lightning got extended with tired players on the ice, and Caufield began firing from everywhere. They didn’t connect, but something sparked.
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The next shift out for the line didn’t have Caufield on it yet, because Alex Newhook hadn’t switched out. Suzuki and Slafkovsky were on the ice, but Newhook hadn’t yet had the chance to make the change. The puck funnelled to him behind the net, where he saw Andrei Vasilevskiy not hugging his post.
Newhook knew exactly what he was doing when he banked it off the back of the Tampa Bay goalie and into the net. The Canadiens took a 2-1 lead with less than nine minutes left. Both goals were oddities. It was as if the ghosts of the Forum had had enough bad vibes.
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The Lightning would come hard looking for a chance to force a fifth overtime in the series. Dobes needed to be at his best. He was. He won the goaltender battle by a long shot. Dobes had a goals saved above expected of 1.43, while Vasilevskiy had a minus-1.23.
For the series, Dobes had a 2.03 goals against average and a .923 save percentage. Remarkably, he didn’t have to make a great save late in the game. With the Lightning on the power play with six seconds left, Suzuki blocked a shot that was destined to get to the net with danger lurking there.
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They did it. Montreal got nine shots on goal and they somehow did it. Hockey is the most chaotic of sports. It is a sport of bounces. It is a sport where you can get a couple of breaks and get a hot goaltender and you can win with nine shots. You can ice the puck in the final two minutes and one can hit a stick that is lying on the ice for minutes, and another time, the puck just mysteriously slows down.
Two icings that weren’t icings as a minute ticked off the clock, instead of a faceoff in the Canadiens zone. It was as if it was meant to be.
Wilde GoatsAbsolutely not.
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Wilde CardsThis group is just getting started. They are the youngest team in the NHL, yet they are already into the final eight, vying for the Stanley Cup. The experience that this group is getting right now as they prepare for the Buffalo Sabres will last for the next decade that this Canadiens club is expected to shine.
The seeds to win the Stanley Cup are planted with series such as this. The experience cannot be taught in any other way than simply being in it. And they are definitely in it, and they are prospering.
The next series will play out differently. The Suzuki line had to face some of the best players in the entire world. They had the toughest matchup they could imagine. They had to find a way to stop the great Nikita Kucherov and his experienced group.
The Sabres don’t have that high-level greatness in their lineup, but what they do have is a very deep roster. Their third and fourth lines are almost indistinguishable from their first and second lines. They don’t have the top-tier talent that the Lightning have, but they have the support talent throughout the lineup.
The key will be finding a way to stop Tage Thompson. He’s killed the Canadiens in the regular season, and he is a big-bodied handful in the playoffs.
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On defence, even the third pair is full of talent. The Suzuki line should have an easier time than they did in this first round. Caufield should be able to beat the one goal that he scored in the first round. However, the success that the Kirby Dach line had will likely not be matched.
While Dach enjoyed the weakness of the support lines of the Lightning, he will face difficult matchups against the Sabres. The third pair of the Canadiens’ defence also enjoyed some terrific analytic numbers against the weaker Tampa players, but against the Sabres, it will be a difficult test every single shift.
The Sabres have no roster weakness, but their strength isn’t as great as some of the top players in the entire world. It will be fun to watch it play out. It starts Wednesday. Welcome to the second round, Montreal.
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