Blogging About The Montreal Canadiens and Canadiens Hockey

Jaroslav Halak made 38 saves to lead the Montreal Canadiens to their first win in three games at home which breaks the two game losing streak. This has been a year of opportunities for Halak and he’s not taking them lightly. Last nights shut out was the sixth of his career and the second of the season as the Canadiens won by a score of 2-0.

Benoit Pouliot scored late in the first period with a snipe over the glove of Vokoun and Brian Gionta concreted the win with an empty netter at the end of the third. That’s Pouliot’s fourth goal in 8 games for the Habs this season making him a pretty good return for Guillaume Latendresse. A lot of people had Pouliot overrated as a guy who would never really meet his potential but I think he’s doing a pretty damn good job.

Three stars: 3. Benoit Pouliot 2. Tomas Vokoun 1. Jaroslav Halak

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It’s safe to say that Andrei Markov is the biggest impact player on this team. Since his return the Canadiens have lost just one game and he’s averaging just over a point per game with 3 goals and 8 assists in 8 games. Three of those assists came in last nights 5-4 win over the Florida Panthers.

Goals in the win came from Hal Gill, Mike Cammalleri, Tomas Plekanec, Marc-Andre Bergeron and Benoit Pouliot.

Halak managed 32 of 36 saves for an .888 save percentage.

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As we’ve seen in the past games between these two teams are generally close, and tonight was no exception with the Montreal Canadiens winning in overtime with a score of 3-2.

Goals came from Scott Gomez, Tomas Plekanec and Andrei Kostitsyn with the OT winner. Andrei Markov had two assists while Mike Cammalleri added one assist of his own.

Jaroslav Halak had yet another outstanding outing stopping 47 of 49 shots to give him a .959 save percentage. This records Halak’s 4th win in a row and gives the Canadiens the 2 points that they needed to spring ahead of both the Atlanta Thrashers and New York Rangers who both have 40 points.

With the assist tonight, Andrei Markov has 6 points in the 5 games that he has played this season. Just imagine if he didn’t get injured…The sky is the limit.

Three Stars: 3. Mike Komisarek 2. Andrei Kostitsyn 1. Jaroslav Halak

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Now that is how you need to be playing against the last place team in the league, not barely win in overtime as the Canadiens did the last time these two teams met. Goals from Glen Metropolit, Andrei Kostitsyn, Sergei Kostitsyn and Andrei Markov lead to a 5-1 win over the Carolina Hurricanes in last nights game.

Halak had his third straight outstanding performance stopping 46 of the 47 shots that he faced giving him a .978 save percentage. Halak’s value is rising quicker then ever these days, but does anyone want to see him traded? I don’t really think that we could get a better goalie tandem right now.

Benoit Pouliot played his first game as a Canadien last night amassing 13 minutes of ice time with no points and 2 shots on goal.

Three Stars: 3. Glen Metropolit 2. Jaroslav Halak 1. Tomas Plekanec

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Marc-Andre Bergeron scored with 1 minute and 45 seconds left in the third period tied the game up and his goal just 2 minutes and 23 seconds into OT concreted the win for the Montreal Canadiens. Tomas Plekanec and Andrei Kostitsyn also added a goal in the second to give the Canadiens a 4-3 win over the Atlanta Thrashers.

Unfortunately it appears that Marc-Andre Bergeron may have been injured on his game winning goal by Johan Hedberg’s skate. We should know more very very soon.

Halak made 47 saves in a .940 save percentage performance for a second straight win. He made some great saves and really did a good job at bailing the defense out when they got caught.

Three Stars: 3. Nik Antropov 2. Tomas Plekanec 1. Marc-Andre Bergeron

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If it wasn’t obvious how much of a difference that Andrei Markov makes to this team after last nights win then I don’t know what to tell you. His first game back, Andrei Markov notched two power play goals with a +2 defensive rating. Glen Metropolit also added a power play goal as the Montreal Canadiens broke their losing stream with a 3-0 win over the New York Islanders.

Halak made some incredible saves in this one and absolutely deserved the shutout. He must have denied Matt Moulson at least 7 times in this one, just ridiculous. He finished with a 40 save performance and his first shutout of the year.

I really hope that with the return of Markov that our luck will turn around because we really need it. After this goals I think the team in general got better just knowing he was on the ice because some nice passing lead to some nice goal chances.

Game Stars: 3. Marc-Andre Bergeron 2. Andrei Markov 1. Jaroslav Halak

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The only thing that I can say about this game is WOW, Kostitsyn is on fire! This is exactly what I expect from A. Kost, what a backhand!

Unfortunately one goal was all the Canadiens could muster in this one as Backstrom was very solid last night.

Price didn’t have his best game but not much you can do when the puck just ends up on the enemies stick in the right spot.

Three Stars: 3. Andrei Kostitsyn 2. Nick Schultz 1. Mikko Koivu

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Although the Montreal Canadiens came out to an early 1-0 lead on a goal by Travis Moen, Brodeur shut the door on all subsequent attempts leading the New Jersey Devils to 2-1 win over the Habs.

I would just like to say that Travis Moen was an excellent pickup, even more so than some of the other pickups the Canadiens made this off-season. His lone goal came on the penalty kill with a nice backhand five hole on Brodeur.

Price made 25 of 27 saves for a .925 performance. You definitely can’t blame Pricey for the majority of these losses with the numbers that he’s putting up. We just need to get more pucks in the net. How we do that is beyond me.

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Andrei Kostitsyn had his second two goal game in a row but it wasn’t enough to get a win over the Buffalo Sabres. Untimely penalties seem to be the trend in the last two losses which is something that the Canadiens are going to need to improve if they expect to make the playoffs.

Adding to Kostitsyn’s goal was a goal from Mike Cammalleri who went top shelf with a pass from Andrei Kostitsyn. The top line of Andrei Kostitsyn, Mike Cammalleri and Tomas Plekanec combined for 7 points on the night.

Jaroslav Halak stopped 23 of the 27 shots he faced giving him an .851 save percentage which is not good enough to beat a team like Buffalo.

Three Stars: 3. Jochen Hecht 2. Tyler Myers 1. Andrei Kostitsyn

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It was a tough game but a goal by Kovalchuck early in overtime lead to just one point for the Canadiens.

Goals for the Canadiens came from Glen Metropolit and Andrei Kostitsyn who notched 2 including a Kovalev-esque one-timer which was an absolute bomb.

Price stopped 30 of the 34 shots that he faced finishing with an .882 save percentage. Watching the highlights after the game it would have been mighty hard for Pricey to have stopped many of those goals.

Three Stars: 3. Andrei Kostitsyn 2. Colby Armstrong 1. Ilya Kovalchuck

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