Canadiens vs. Golden Knights Round 3 Game 4: Game thread, rosters, lines, and how to watch

2021 Stanley Cup Semifinals Game 4

Montreal Canadiens vs. Vegas Golden Knights

MTL leads 2-1

How to watch

Start time: 8:00 PM EDT / 5:00 PM PDT
In Canada: CBC, Sportsnet (English), TVA Sports (French)
In the U.S.: NBCSN
Streaming: NHL.tv/NHL Live, Sportsnet Now

The Canadiens probably should be trailing 2-1 in the series. Vegas controlled the play all night long in Game 3, and had a 2-1 lead late, with Carey Price about to head to the bench for an extra attacker in a last-ditch effort to tie things up. Before it got to that point, Marc-Andre Fleury added another puck-handling disaster to his lowlight reel, sending the puck right out to the front of the net where the speedy Josh Anderson pounced to tie the game. The Habs looked like a completely different club in the sudden-death period, holding the majority of possession and getting another goal of the stick of Anderson to pull off the win.

Fleury’s gaffe cost the Golden Knights the lead in the series, and it seems the coaching staff feels the same way as well, because it looks like Fleury will be put in timeout behind the glass on the opposite side of the rink tonight, and Robin Lehner will get the call in goal for his second start of the post-season. His first one wasn’t very strong, surrendering seven goals to the Colorado Avalanche in Game 1 of Round 2.

It’s entirely possible that this is all a bit of gamesmanship from Vegas, and Fleury will be back in for the game. After all, we just witnessed a similar tactic from the Canadiens with Jeff Petry in Game 2. But as for now all indications are that Lehner will be the one in goal as the team hopes for a more stable performance from its netminder.

Ragardless of who is in, the Canadiens need to play more like they did in the overtime period than what they showed in the 60 minutes of regulation. They know they can at least hang with Golden Knights when they’re on their game, and they’ll be feeling confident that Price can outduel Lehner — or Fleury — if the game comes down to that.

Montreal Canadiens projected lineup

Scratches

F: Alex Belzile, Laurent Dauphin, Michael Frolik, Tomas Tatar, Lukas Vejdemo, Jesse Ylönen
D: Cale Fleury, Brett Kulak, Xavier Ouellet, Alexander Romanov
G: Charlie Lindgren, Michael McNiven, Cayden Primeau

Injured/Ill

F: Jonathan Drouin (leave of absence), Jake Evans (concussion)

Vegas Golden Knights projected lineup