Brady Tkachuk scored his first goal of the season to lift the Ottawa Senators to a 5-2 win over the Montreal Canadiens at the Bell Centre on Tuesday night.

After a reassuring start in Vegas on Friday, Samuel Montembeault was back to making Habs fans sweat. He allowed five goals on 29 shots, and while too many times the Sens were allowed to walk in uncontested, Montembeault was unable to bail out his porous defensive corps.

The pairing of Lane Hutson and Jayden Struble were each minus-3 on the night. Even the usually reliable Jake Evans spent most of the third period glued to the bench and played a season-low 9:22 after going minus-3.

Things started off well for the Habs with a power play goal. Juraj Slafkovsky was set up by former linemates Cole Caufield and Nick Suzuki for his eighth of the season.

But the Sens responded just 24 seconds later. Fabian Zetterlund scored on his team’s second shot of the night on a one-timer from far out.

A good example of Montembeault not getting help from his teammates: Artem Zub was left alone in the slot and he was able to deke out the goalie to give Ottawa a 2-1 lead after 20 minutes.

Early in the second, the Sens scored twice in a span of 1:10. Habs fans started looking over at backup Jakub Dobes to see if he would come in to replace to beleaguered Montembeault, but with Montreal playing tomorrow, it was Monty’s cross to bear. Both had him turned inside out, starting with Jake Sanderson cutting inside with ease.

Then it was Drake Batherson getting to bat home his own rebound to extend Ottawa’s lead to 4-1 at 6:58 of the second.

The only aspect of the game where the Habs didn’t struggle was with the man-advantage. Suzuki scored the team’s second power play goal of the night to put Montreal to within striking distance, down 4-2. Suzuki reached the 30-point mark in just his 25th game. Caufield also collected his second helper of the night.

The comeback kids were nowhere to be found in the third period, despite the importance of a divisional matchup. With fans hollering for a penalty after Brendan Gallagher was dumped behind Ottawa’s net, Tkachuk made the boos intensify by scoring his first of the season to give his club a commanding 5-2 lead. The Sens captain missed 20 games with a broken thumb and only came back on Friday.

It was a night to forget for the Habs, especially in their own end. Noah Dobson collided with Lars Eller and left the ice in discomfort. While he did stay in the game, he ended up playing 18:51, just the second time this season he’s played under 20 minutes. He was minus-2. Are the Habs missing Kaiden Guhle out there? They did start out 4-1 with him and have gone 9-8-3 since he partially tore his adductor muscle. Only the third pairing survived the night, according to Hockey Stat Cards:

It wasn’t just the defence that seemed out of sorts. The liveblog commenters over on the Hockey Inside Out YouTube channel livestream felt the bottom six played too much while contributing very little. So far, substituting the injured Kirby Dach and Alex Newhook with Alexandre Texier and Florian Xhekaj hasn’t helped with scoring.

And the contracts of Brendan Gallagher and Josh Anderson have become a hot topic again. The pair count for $12M against the salary cap this year and next, and have scored a combined six goals. Five of them by Anderson.

Here’s what the commenters had to say:

3. “Nothing worse than losing to the Sens. Such a useless team.” — Joseph Barrie

 

2. “Truth bomb: Veleno, Texier & Flo-Jo would not be playing if not for injured players. Our goalies are worst in league.” — Air Conditioner

 

1. “I know I’m in the minority but I’m starting to get fed up of MSL and his curious decisions.” — Marc Taillefer