The Montreal Canadiens prevailed 4-3 in a shootout in a wild and highly entertaining game against the New York Rangers on Saturday night at the Bell Centre.
And it was a statement game by goaltender Sam Montembeault, who turned aside 45-shots and stopped all three shooters in the shootout.
When asked if Montembeault was the Canadiens’ number one goaltender, head coach Martin St Louis wouldn’t tip his hand.
“He’s playing like a number one.”
Of course, St Louis has to manage his hockey team and this season part of that has entailed juggling three goalies.
But Montembeault has separated himself from Jake Allen and Cayden Primeau. While Montembeault is getting more starts than the other two, the Canandiens need to find out how he can perform with a heavier workload. Allen and Primeau can share the back up starts from now on, if they don’t like it, too bad.
Pluses:
- The story was Sam Montembeault. Several highlight reel saves, none better than his stop on Mika Zibanejad’s shootout attempt. Zibanejad tried the deke made famous by Peter Forsberg, deking to his right and trying to tuck the puck in with only his left hand on the stick. Montembeault sniffed out the move and put his paddle down at the last second.
- Brendan Gallagher scored for the first time in 25-games and it was an absolute SNIPE. Yes, his contract sucks… But enough with making him the new whipping boy, analytics suggest he’s having a decent season.
- Cool to see St Louis elect to put Sean Monahan between two young players in Jesse Ylonen and Emil Heineman. And the move paid off.
- Joel Armia scores in back to back games.
Minuses:
- After jumping out to a 3-0 lead, the Habs got bullied by the New York Rangers in the second half. New York showed why they are the league’s top team.
Montreal’s next game is on Wednesday night in Philadelphia against the Flyers at 7pm.
thehabsblog.com 
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