The Montreal Canadiens have a chance to seriously damage the Buffalo Sabers in Monday night’s playoff race as the two teams cross blades.
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In fact, the Sabers are six points behind the Pittsburgh Penguins, who are ranked second in the Eastern Conference team draft with 10 games left. A defeat would therefore take them considerably further from their goal.
The New York State side have had a rough time of late but are coming out of the water with back-to-back wins.
“They are a team with a lot of offense and it will be up to us to play well defensively, to follow our rules and not give them time on the ice so that they make as few plays as possible,” explained David Savard back in the press conference . If we do that, we had a chance.”
Beneficial stability
The Habs, for their part, defeated the Columbus Blue Jackets 8-2 in their last game on Saturday. Head coach Martin St-Louis will be counting on Jake Allen to defend his team’s net; The veteran lost 4-2 to the Boston Bruins in his last game on Thursday. This pick also indicates that Samuel Montembeault will play the Philadelphia Flyers on Tuesday.
For Savard, betting on an identical or nearly identical formation shows a slowly but surely developing stability.
“It makes it a little bit easier, except the team is playing better these days. I think we’ve gotten back to our concepts and that explains our successes, said Mike Matheson’s partner on the blue line. But when you play with the same person, some things become easier and you get more used to them and their way of playing. But at this point in the year we found ourselves with quite a few guys, and no matter what couples, we know what the others are going to do.
Forward Sean Farrell, who accepted a contract from the team the day before, will join the team. He has also prepared his new sweater for him: As the official CH account reports, the American will wear the number 57.
-For the Sabers, Tage Thompson’s presence is uncertain and a decision will be made shortly before the game. Frustrated by an upper-body injury, he leads his club this year with 44 goals.
CH: Nick Suzuki among the three stars of the week in the NHL
Canadiens captain Nick Suzuki received the second star of last week’s National Hockey League activity Monday after contributing to his team’s two wins in three games.
The No. 14 had two goals and six assists to lead the team to wins over the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday and the Columbus Blue Jackets on Saturday. He also set a personal best that day with four points. He also became the Montreal club’s first player in almost 14 years to have four consecutive appearances with two or more points: Alex Kovalev managed the feat in 2008-2009.
Suzuki leads the Canadian with 61 points and his 23 goals put him three behind Cole Caufield, who still leads the team in that regard.
Los Angeles Kings forward Viktor Arvidsson received the first star, while Minnesota Wild goaltender Filip Gustavsson received the third.
CH: Discover this familiar face that has visited the players
A Montreal Canadiens visit to the home of the Sabers always seems to be on the cards for one former player interested in the confrontation for a number of reasons: Brian Gionta.
The 44-year-old native of Rochester, a city in upstate New York not far from Buffalo, was spotted in the corridors of the KeyBank Center on Monday morning, a few hours before the game. Additionally, journalists saw him speak to Nick Suzuki in an interview with the current captain of the Habs and the 44-year-old man who went by the letter “C” with the organization from 2010 to 2014.
Rogers Monday Night Hockey out of Buffalo as the Sabers try to keep their playoff drive alive against the Canadiens. 7:00 PM CET/4:00 PM PT on @sportsnet EAST & PACIFIC.
Captains meeting this morning with Nick Suzuki and Brian Gionta.
(Razor cameo) pic.twitter.com/KqWfT4gIsR—John Bartlett (@BartsBytes) March 27, 2023
That’s how the presence of the American, who then ran with the Sabers for three campaigns, was noted by head coach Martin St-Louis.
“Hockey is a small world and everyone is welcome. It’s nice that he can touch our young players,” said the driver at a press conference.
St-Louis, 47, also drew parallels between his professional background and that of Gionta, whom he met often as he began a career as an instructor after retirement. The two men faced each other several times on the ice, but also behind the bench in the smaller ranks.
“He’s a little younger than me but his physique was similar to mine and he played in college. We went the same way and showed that we can continue to develop in the league, even if we weren’t that big and the National League [LNH] was harder. Brian showed a lot of toughness for a small player and was held in high esteem throughout the NHL,” St-Louis said.
If the latter sported the colors of the University of Vermont and had a brilliant career despite being 5 feet 8 inches, “Gio”, an inch shorter, can boast of excelling at Boston College, then in the NHL. They have in common the point of having won the Stanley Cup.