Less than 24 hours after losing 4-2 to the Chicago Blackhawks, the Montreal Canadiens were back on the ice to take on the red hot Colorado Avalanche. The hosts had won their last six games and were 8-2 in their last 10.
For a second night in a row, the Habs had to make do without sniper Patrik Laine and veteran blueliner David Savard, meaning Michael Pezzetta and Jayden Struble were in again. On the power play though, Joel Armia didn’t pull first wave duty, Kirby Dach did. Jakub Dobes was back in net for the second start of his young career and he had a tall order in front of him.
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The Canadiens were unable to even get a shot on goal in the first nine minutes and by the time they finally got one to Mackenzie Blackwood, the Avs already had a one goal lead. Thanks to a couple of early penalties to Montreal, one to Cole Caufield and the other to Alex Newhook, Colorado was able to get comfortable real fast.
Their goal came on the second power play from a nice Cale Makar, Nathan MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen play. It was the only puck that got past Dobes in the first frame though, and after 20 minutes, Colorado had a 1-0 lead and an 8-4 edge in shot. This was not good news for Montreal since the Avs were one of only three teams that haven’t lost when leading after the first frame. Meanwhile, the Canadiens were 1-11-1 when trailing after the first stanza.
Although the Habs could only muster four shots, they came close to scoring when Caufield, Nick Suzuki and Juraj Slafkovsky were able to execute their little “give and go and go play”, but Blackwood stood tall. The first line has run that play so often in practice now that they’ve got it perfected, the only thing is the finish.
The second frame was eerily similar to the first, at the halfway point in the game, the Canadiens only had six shots on net. Thankfully, they woke up in the second 10 minutes of the middle frame and had 12 shots by the end of it.
If Montreal had trouble getting the puck to Blackwood’s net, they played a pretty solid defensive game. After 40 minutes, Dobes had only faced 13 shots, but he did make a couple of big saves, including one in the dying seconds on Rantanen. The youngster looks very calm and collected in net, he appears very confident and not at all star struck by Colorado’s all-star players.
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The third period was hotly contested and the Canadiens dominated much of it. They were…