The Canadiens schedule didn’t seem to play in their favour by beginning the season with 4 games on the road. But, tonight, the Canadiens will try to cap off their season-starting 4-game road trip with their 4th consecutive win.
Having outscored their opponents 10-4 over the first 3 games of the season, the Canadiens will be playing arguably their toughest opponent of the roadtrip, with Sidney Crosby, Phil Kessel and Evgeni Malkin making up the most potent offensive collective of any of the teams the Canadiens have faced thus far. With Phil Kessel being the only of the Penguins‘ big three to collect any points (1 goal), the Penguins are hoping their first 2 games of the season are just aberrations, and go into tonight’s game with only minor changes to their lineup (such as David Perron being moved to Evgeni Malkin’s left wing after having spent time on the 3rd line for the first two games, including the Pens 2-1 loss against the Arizona Coyotes on Sunday night).
While the Canadiens are second in the league in goals-for-goals-against differential (+6, 1 behind the Tampa Bay Lightning who are +7), there is still the incredible issue of the Canadiens putrid powerplay, which went 0/7 on Sunday against the Senators, is 1/14 in the first 3 games played, and going back to last season’s playoffs, is 3/60 (6%) on the man-advantage. What’s even more troubling than just the stats, is the effect of a powerplay that bad. First, as it happened on Sunday, the Canadiens powerplay is a momentum booster for the opponent, and secondly, it allows their opponent to take advantage of illegal plays, intimidation and crooked hits without really having to suffer any consequences. Michel Therrien has addressed the powerplay issues by assigning J.J. Daigneault with the project of finding the answer to the team’s man-advantage woes. I won’t say much more about the powerplay. Jack Han posted a really good piece about the powerplay this morning that is definitely worth the read if you want a clear cut report on why it hasn’t been working.
The good news for the Canadiens as far as tonight’s match with the Penguins go is that the Penguins have had a lot of trouble generating offense in their first 2 games, and the Canadiens have done a fairly good job at defending. As far as building a season campaign goes, the Penguins seem a step behind the Canadiens, but can easily make up ground if their scorers get going.
The puck drops at 7PM EDT.
How To Watch:
In Canadiens region (French): RDS
In Canada (English): CITYM
In the Penguins’ region: ROOT
In the US: NHL Network
Elsewhere: NHL GameCenter, NHL Center Ice
| Left Wing |
Center |
Right Wing |
| Max Pacioretty | Tomas Plekanec | Brendan Gallagher |
| Lars Eller | Alex Galchenyuk | Alexander Semin |
| Tomas Fleischmann | David Desharnais | Dale Weise |
| Brian Flynn | Torrey Mitchell | Devante Smith-Pelly |
| Left Defense |
Right Defense |
| Andrei Markov | P.K. Subban |
| Alexei Emelin | Jeff Petry |
| Nathan Beaulieu | Tom Gilbert |
| Goaltenders |
| Carey Price |
| Mike Condon |
Scratched: Greg Pateryn, Jarred Tinordi, Paul Byron
Injuries: Michael Bournival (post-concussion syndrome)
| Left Wing |
Center |
Right Wing |
| Chris Kunitz | Sidney Crosby | Phil Kessel |
| David Perron | Evgeni Malkin | Patric Hornqvist |
| Sergei Plotnikov | Nick Bonino | Beau Bennett |
| Kevin Porter | Matt Cullen | Daniel Sprong |
| Left Defense |
Right Defense |
| Ian Cole | Kris Letang |
| Olli Maata | Ben Lovejoy |
| Brian Dumoulin | Rob Scuderi |
| Goaltenders |
| Marc-Andre Fleury |
| Jeff Zatkoff |
Scratched: Adam Clendening, Tim Erixon, Bobby Farnham
Injuries: Pascal Dupuis (lower body), Eric Fehr (elbow)
Check out the enemy over at PensBurgh.
