Last Saturday, the Canadiens opened the scoring at Winnipeg — and lost.
Two nights earlier, Montreal scored first against Pittsburgh and lost. In fact, the Canadiens have scored first in three of their last four games, only to come up empty. At home against Washington on Dec. 7, the Canadiens squandered a first-period, two-goal lead.
According to the 82games.com website, NHL teams that score first win 67 per cent of their games.
“We’ve helped the average come down,” Canadiens head coach Martin St. Louis quipped following Monday’s practice at the CN Sports Complex in Brossard.
“The last (few) games I feel like we have a pretty good start, get the first goal and then take a penalty. We’ve got to do a better job in the types of penalties we’re taking. It just changes the momentum. Our penalty-killing, up to the last couple of games, has been pretty strong for us. The last couple of games, for some reason, we’ve struggled at it. We gave up the momentum.
If the Canadiens lack a killer instinct, St. Louis refused to use that as an excuse. Perhaps more information will be gleaned following Tuesday night’s Bell Centre game against the Buffalo Sabres (7 p.m., TSN2, RDS, TSN Radio-690, 98.5 FM).
The Sabres are in the midst of a brutal 10-game winless skid (0-7-3) and, despite having played back-to-back weekend games at Washington and Toronto, were scheduled to hold a practice in Montreal on Monday, a rarity after playing twice in as many days. There also was a published report that team owner Terry Pegula was headed to Montreal to meet his struggling team
While St. Louis is justifiably more concerned about his team, Buffalo could prove the perfect antidote for the Canadiens. The Sabres haven’t made the playoffs in 13 years — the NHL’s longest active playoff drought.
“It’s not like we score the first goal and think we’re going to win,” captain Nick Suzuki said. “Or we give up the first goal and think we’re going to lose. We want to have a lead and we’ve been giving up those leads lately. We have to work on that. But I thought we had a solid game overall (at Winnipeg). We played well and it could have gone either way. They’re a good team. We have to build on that momentum going into (Tuesday).
“We’ve always had good games against (Buffalo). We know they have a lot of talent. They’re going through a rough patch right now. We’ve been in their shoes. Going into (Tuesday) we just want to try not to think about how they’re feeling. Focus on us and put the pressure on them early.”
Following last Thursday’s 9-2 embarrassing defeat against Pittsburgh — the Penguins scored six unanswered third-period goals — many Montreal players were seeking bounceback performances. None more than goaltender Samuel Montembeault, who was replaced by Cayden Primeau after allowing six goals on 26 shots. Montembeault allowed three Winnipeg goals, the fourth coming into an empty net.
“I’m happy with the way I played and felt pretty good in the game,” said Montembeault, expected to make his seventh consecutive start against Buffalo. “I think my angles were good and I felt good in the crease. Obviously we make took too many penalties playing against probably the toughest power play in the league. I think it was a hard-fought battle until the end and could have gone either way.
“Probably desperate,” Montembeault said of the Sabres. “We know they’re a team that’s really good offensively, a team that can score some goals. We know they’re going to come out strong at the beginning. We just have to weather the storm, play a smart and simple game. Not try to do too much. We also have to be desperate. We’ve just lost two in a row.”
The Canadiens are averaging only 24.27 shots per game this season and have yet to surpass 30 in a contest. While this should be cause for concern — one of many on this struggling team — Suzuki isn’t alarmed, suggesting the players seek quality over quantity.
“The style we play is more quality chances,” he said. “We don’t want to give up possession just by firing pucks. There are teams in the league that play that way; that’s their style. But it really hasn’t been our way. The more shots on net you can generate the better. I don’t know how many shots blocked we get per game, but we definitely shoot more than the high 20s.
“It’s not a stat I’m too worried about. We know how to score goals.”
The Canadiens, last in the Atlantic Division, have scored 82 goals in 30 games.