Game 71: Montreal Canadiens vs. Columbus Blue Jackets
Start time: 7:00 PM EDT / 4:00 PM PDT
In the Canadiens region: TSN2 (English), RDS (French)
In the Blue Jackets region: FanDuel Sports Network Ohio
Streaming: ESPN+, RDS, TSN+
Around this time last season, the Montreal Canadiens and Columbus Blue Jackets were battling each other for the final wild-card spot, putting together excellent finishes to overcome poor starts to the season. In the end, it took Montreal going 7-1-2 in the final 10 games to cover off a season-ending six-game winning streak from Columbus to squeak into the post-season on the final day.
The Canadiens were able to carry that improved form into the 2025-26 season and have been in a playoff spot for almost the entire season. That wasn’t the case for the Blue Jackets, as they went into the Christmas break with a 15-15-6 record, sitting in last place in the Eastern Conference. General manager Don Waddell must have spent the few days off over the holidays thinking about making changes. Three weeks later, with the team still last with one of the worst goal differentials in the conference, the decision was made to replace Dean Evason with Rick Bowness.
Under their new coach, Columbus has gone 19-3-4. On Sunday, they were handed their first regulation loss since February 26, bringing a 12-game point streak to an end. That run was not only good enough to lift them into the wild-card race this year, but propel them to the second seed of the Metropolitan Division.
They’ve taken very different paths to get here, but as the Blue Jackets and Canadiens come together late in the 2025-26 season, they’re working to claim home-ice advantage in the opening round rather than just being happy to be in the post-season conversation at all.
Tale of the Tape
| Canadiens | Statistics | Blue Jackets |
|---|---|---|
| 39-21-10 | Record | 38-22-11 |
| 49.1% (21st) | Expected-goal share | 51.6% (8th) |
| 3.53 (3rd) | Goals per game | 3.17 (13th) |
| 3.21 (25th) | Goals against per game | 3.04 (17th) |
| 25.0% (3rd) | PP% | 20.1% (17th) |
| 76.3% (27th) | PK% | 77.9% (22nd) |
| 0-0-1 | Head-to-Head Record | 1-0-0 |
| Cole Caufield (44) | Most goals | Kirill Marchenko (25) |
| Nick Suzuki (62) | Most assists | Zach Werenski (56) |
| Nick Suzuki (86) | Most points | Zach Werenski (77) |
The question for Columbus will be how much they have left for the final push to prevent the teams they worked so hard to pass from retaking their positions. That’s especially the case when it comes to Zach Werenski, the player with the second-highest average ice time in the NHL behind the Minnesota Wild’s Quinn Hughes. So far, he doesn’t seem to be feeling any fatigue, just playing 29:01 versus the New York Islanders a night after being deployed for 24:07, and then recording a goal and an assist on Tuesday after a day off to recover. He has an 18-point lead over the second player on the Blue Jackets’ scoring list, and is five points behind Evan Bouchard for the league lead in points by a defenceman.
While Werenski seems to be built for the toughest deployments, Mike Matheson may not be. Montreal’s time-on-ice leader, at 24:25, has now gone seven games without a point, and last hit the scoresheet versus a team in a playoff position before the Olympic break. On Tuesday night versus the Carolina Hurricanes, when the Canadiens faced 16 shots in the opening period, Matheson was on the ice for 11 of them, including the two that went in the net. Fatigue seems to be setting in for Martin St-Louis’s most trusted defenceman, and there are no two-day breaks left on the schedule for any type of recovery.
Help seems to be coming at just the right time for the Habs. Kaiden Guhle was a major contributing force on Saturday versus the Islanders with a three-point performance, and Jayden Struble was one of Montreal’s best players on Tuesday, one of three blue-liners, along with partner Lane Hutson and Alexandre Carrier, to finish their five-on-five minutes with a positive expected-goal differential. The Blue Jackets may lean heavily on one player to control things from the back end, but these recent performances suggest that the Canadiens don’t have to do the same.
