Game 73: Montreal Canadiens vs. Carolina Hurricanes
Start time: 7:00 PM EDT / 4:00 PM PDT
In Canada: CityTV (English), TVA Sports (French)
In the Hurricanes region: Bally Sports South
Streaming: ESPN+, Sportsnet+
With Kaiden Guhle forced to sit out this game with a suspension, Martin St-Louis will have to go with a different defensive formation to the one responsible for a three-game winning streak. Johnny Kovacevic comes back in, and we’ll find out what the coach’s plan is for the pairings and their minutes.
Juraj Slafkovský will be looking to extend his career-best point streak to 10 games on his 20th birthday. There are no more teenage records for him to break, but he can start working on some under-21 milestones. He and Suzuki enter the game hot, and the Habs will need their offence to keep pace with the Hurricanes.
They, and Cole Caufield, who has taken on the role as the defensively responsible forward on his line, will be seeing a lot of the new Jake Guentzel-Sebastian Aho-Seth Jarvis line, and need to come out at least even in that matchup to give the Habs a chance. With Guhle out, those three might be seeing a lot of minutes with David Savard, trying to limit the shots for that powerful Hurricanes trio.
Montreal Canadiens projected lineup
| Left Wing |
Centre |
Right Wing |
| #22 Cole Caufield |
#14 Nick Suzuki |
#20 Juraj Slafkovský |
| #11 Brendan Gallagher |
#35 Alex Newhook |
#40 Joel Armia |
| #17 Josh Anderson |
#71 Jake Evans |
#56 Jesse Ylönen |
| #55 Michael Pezzetta |
#36 Colin White |
#49 Rafaël Harvey-Pinard |
| Left Defence |
Right Defence |
| #8 Mike Matheson |
$54 Jordan Harris |
| #72 Arber Xhekaj |
#58 David Savard |
| #47 Jayden Struble |
#26 Johnny Kovacevic |
| Starter |
Backup |
| #35 Samuel Montembeault |
#30 Cayden Primeau |
Injured: Kirby Dach, Christian Dvorak, Joshua Roy, Chris Wideman
Suspended: Kaiden Guhle
Scratched: Tanner Pearson
Carolina Hurricanes projected lineup
| Left Wing |
Centre |
Right Wing |
| Jake Guentzel |
Sebastian Aho |
Seth Jarvis |
| Andrei Svechnikov |
Jordan Staal |
Teuvo Teravainen |
| Jordan Martinook |
Evgeny Kuznetsov |
Martin Necas |
| Jesperi Kotkaniemi |
Jack Drury |
Stefan Noesen |
| Left Defence |
Right Defence |
| Jaccob Slavin |
Brent Burns |
| Brady Skjei |
Brett Pesce |
| Dmitry Orlov |
Jalen Chatfield |
| Starter |
Backup |
| Pyotr Kochetkov |
Frederik Andersen |
