Game 53: Montreal Canadiens @ San Jose Sharks
Start time: **10:30 PM EST / 7:30 PM PST**
In the Canadiens region: TSN2 (English), RDS (French)
In the Sharks region: NBC Sports California
Streaming: ESPN+, RDS, TSN+
A day after a terrible performance in Anaheim, all of the Canadiens players, especially Patrik Laine and Kirby Dach, knew that the effort wasn’t good enough in the first game of the road trip and promised better in the second one. The team has been trying and failing to get by with just the top line playing at a high level, and that needs to change if they want to halt the losing streak at five games.
It really shouldn’t take much to beat the San Jose Sharks, the last-place team in the NHL, but it will take more than what the Habs brought to the last game. They can’t just squeak by the Sharks tonight, they need to establish (to themselves more than anyone) that they’re not in that class anymore. An offence that has had issues scoring during this losing streak with just eight goals in the last five games has a chance to kick itself into gear.
Montreal Canadiens projected lineup
Left Wing |
Centre |
Right Wing |
#13 Cole Caufield |
#14 Nick Suzuki |
#20 Juraj Slafkovský |
#92 Patrik Laine |
#71 Jake Evans |
#40 Joel Armia |
#35 Alex Newhook |
#77 Kirby Dach |
#17 Josh Anderson |
#62 Owen Beck |
#28 Christian Dvorak |
#11 Brendan Gallagher |
Left Defence |
Right Defence |
#8 Mike Matheson |
#48 Lane Hutson |
#72 Arber Xhekaj |
#45 Alexandre Carrier |
#47 Jayden Struble |
#58 David Savard |
Starter |
Backup |
#35 Samuel Montembeault |
#75 Jakub Dobeṧ |
Scratched: Logan Mailloux, Michael Pezzetta
Injured: Kaiden Guhle, Emil Heineman
San Jose Sharks projected lineup
Left Wing |
Centre |
Right Wing |
William Eklund |
Macklin Celebrini |
Tyler Toffoli |
Fabian Zetterlund |
Andrew Poturalski |
Will Smith |
Collin Graf |
Luke Kunin |
Barclay Goodrow |
Carl Grundstrom |
Colin White |
Walker Duehr |
Left Defence |
Right Defence |
Jake Walman |
Henry Thrun |
Mario Ferraro |
Jack Thompson |
Shakir Mukhamadullin |
Timothy Liljegren |
Starter |
Backup |
Alexandar Georgiev |
Vitek Vanecek |