TAMPA \u2014 From his very first shift of Game 1 against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Sunday, Montreal Canadiens forward Juraj Slafkovsk\u00fd looked like a player intent on having an impact on this series.<\/p>\n
He was physical and purposeful, exactly the kind of player the Canadiens hoped they were getting when they took Slafkovsk\u00fd with the No. 1 pick in the 2022 NHL Draft.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst shift I was just trying to go out there and hit some guys to get myself into the game, to get going,\u201d Slafkovsk\u00fd said. \u201cI feel like it\u2019s a good way to start. All the lines, they went out there and started really physical. It\u2019s a good way to set the tone for the start of the game and I think it helped our team today.\u201d<\/p>\n
Slafkovsk\u00fd\u2019s three power-play goals helped the Canadiens secure a 4-3 win in Game 1 and wrest home-ice advantage in the series away from the Lightning.<\/p>\n
Slafkovsk\u00fd scored the game-winner for the Canadiens 1:22 into overtime. And more than his first playoff hat trick, Slafkovsk\u00fd was more concerned about even needing to get a third goal to get a win.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was pretty nice. I like that feeling,\u201d he said. \u201cBut we don\u2019t want to go to overtime, hopefully we can close out games before that. I\u2019m happy the way it happened, but we\u2019ve still got to focus before next game.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Canadiens only mustered 19 shots on goal in the game, but Slafkovsk\u00fd had seven of them. He was a runaway train all night.<\/p>\n
The Lightning had their own runaway train in Brandon Hagel, who missed the last two regular-season meetings against the Canadiens but scored twice and was a menace all night. They also got a goal from Darren Raddysh off a bomb on the power play in the first period.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re in for a treat if Game 1 was any indication of how the Canadiens and Lightning plan to go about things.<\/p>\n
Tampa\u2019s self-inflicted wounds<\/p>\n
The Lighting gave up three power-play goals, including the OT winner, and post-game were irate at themselves. Head coach Jon Cooper was asked if he was upset with all the penalty calls.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, I had a problem with us,\u201d Cooper said. \u201cI mean, come on, we took four offensive zone penalties. Just look at them. That\u2019s not over-aggression. That\u2019s just stupidity, you know, a lot of them. That was on us. That was a game that we just gave them an opportunity to win. This is the Stanley Cup playoffs. This isn\u2019t Game 62. So that is extremely disappointing in the way we conducted ourselves and the amount of penalties we took. Now let\u2019s be honest, they (Montreal) went 3-for-6 or whatever it was? So if you\u2019re going to kill penalties off at 50 percent, then you\u2019re probably not going to last very long.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was echoed by Brandon Hagel, who played a heck of a game but as one of the team\u2019s key penalty killers, was not happy at all on that end of things.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe knew they had a good power play, we got to execute on the penalty kill, it\u2019s pretty simple,\u2019\u2019 Hagel said. \u201cIt starts with myself and it starts with (Anthony) Cirelli. It\u2019s our job to kill penalties off. And we didn\u2019t do that.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
The matchup game<\/p>\n
Yanni Gourde has got some deserved mention for Selke Trophy votes this season for his excellent defensive work, the Lightning deploying his line against the other team\u2019s top offensive threats. He\u2019s played a lot of hard matchup minutes. But isn\u2019t it interesting, and not really that surprising, that Cooper chose to match up Cirelli against Nick Suzuki\u2019s top line for Montreal on Sunday.<\/p>\n
\u201cTwo really good lines going up against each other,\u201d Suzuki said. \u201cIt kind of felt like it was a lot of just up and down the ice and neutral zone, not a lot of O-zone time for either line. So it was important that we contribute, and the power play did its job tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n
When push comes to shove, coaches reveal their true feelings about their players in crunch time during the playoffs.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s not a dig on Gourde at all, but Cirelli remains one of the NHL\u2019s premier two-way players and the Lightning clearly feel his higher skill level matches better against Suzuki. In any case, Cooper had Gourde\u2019s checking unit often matched up against Phillip Danault\u2019s checking unit, which is a bit strange on the surface, but it allowed Brayden Point\u2019s top line to free itself of Danault\u2019s line more often with Tampa having last line change. The result was Point\u2019s top line with superstar Nikita Kucherov and Gage Goncalves getting mostly Montreal\u2019s second line centered by Alex Newhook. That is pretty ideal for Tampa, and one wouldn\u2019t think so much for Montreal.<\/p>\n
The question was how Montreal would react, but head coach Martin St. Louis didn\u2019t really try to avoid those matchups. And given that Montreal doesn\u2019t have last line change here in Tampa for the opening two games, St. Louis is limited in what he can do. But there\u2019s probably some merit in trying to get Danault out there once in a while, if possible, against Point. St. Louis unsurprisingly did not want to get into his reasons for why he allowed the matchup game to go as it did.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really not going to answer that question,\u201d St. Louis said. \u201cIt\u2019s always a cat and mouse game.\u201d<\/p>\n
But he did seem at least satisfied with how the Newhook line did against Point and Kucherov.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know they\u2019re coming, Kuch is coming and Point\u2019s coming, and now how can I get the right matchup?\u201d St. Louis said. \u201cI thought he handled it pretty good.\u201d<\/p>\n
The rookie against the master<\/p>\n
One of the biggest mismatches in this series appeared to be in goal, with Canadiens rookie Jakub Dobe\u0161 facing the Lightning\u2019s Andrei Vasilevskiy.<\/p>\n
On Saturday after practice, Vasilevskiy was asked about facing Dobe\u0161, and twice referenced how short Dobe\u0161\u2019 run of success has really been, especially when compared to his track record of success that spans years as opposed to weeks.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s been hot for what? The last 10, 15 games for sure,\u201d Vasilevskiy said. \u201cThe whole (Canadiens) team was pretty hot after the Olympic break. Obviously, I\u2019m playing against the team and, to be honest, I don\u2019t really think about the guy on the other side. I\u2019m trying to focus on myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dobe\u0161 more than held his own and gave the Canadiens a chance to win, making a series of big saves in the first period especially to allow his team to survive a bit of a slow start where they put nine shots on Vasilevskiy through the first two periods of play.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like going down on the road early would be pretty tough,\u201d Dobe\u0161 said. \u201cSo I was just trying to have a good start for the team. I\u2019m glad they didn\u2019t score right away.\u201d<\/p>\n
Playoff Anderson showed up as advertised<\/p>\n
There was a definite ramp up in Josh Anderson\u2019s game down the stretch of the regular season, and in particular in the Canadiens\u2019 final matchup with the Lightning on April 9 in Montreal, where he was in the middle of everything. The Canadiens\u2019 physical response to the expected nastiness of the Lightning was seemingly sitting largely on Anderson\u2019s shoulders, though St. Louis disputed the notion that might feel like a burden for Anderson on Sunday morning.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think Andy takes this as a heavy responsibility,\u201d he said. \u201cI feel like Andy, that\u2019s just the way he\u2019s wired. He likes those moments, he gets pulled into it. He\u2019s done it I feel his whole career, he elevates in the playoffs in those moments. And I expect nothing less.\u201d<\/p>\n
His expectations were met.<\/p>\n
Anderson was intense and physical all night, on top of being very disruptive on the Canadiens\u2019 penalty kill. He opened the scoring for Montreal when defenseman Alexandre Carrier, playing his first game back from injury since March 29, chipped a puck off the wall below the Lightning goal line out to Anderson for the finish at 13:24 of the first period.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought he was ready to go right from the start,\u201d Suzuki said of Anderson. \u201cI think his style of play and his energy and speed and physicality is perfect for playoff hockey. He started us off with a big goal, big hits and doing great stuff on the penalty kill. He had a big night for us and we\u2019ll need him for the rest of the playoffs to be playing like that.\u201d<\/p>\n
His physicality cost the Canadiens when Anderson hammered Charle-Edouard D\u2019Astous and was called for charging at 10:55 of the second. The Lightning scored on the ensuing penalty to tie the game, and went up a goal 29 seconds later when Brandon Hagel scored from right in front of Dobe\u0161.<\/p>\n
The thin line between aggression and discipline<\/p>\n
From preseason brawling with rival Florida to some raucous games with Montreal and Buffalo in the last month of the regular season, the Lightning have been an ornery bunch this season. Which, as Brandon Hagel explained to us Saturday, was absolutely by design because as a group the Lightning felt they got pushed around by Florida last year in the playoffs and were committed to not letting that happen again.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not saying we\u2019re the toughest team in the league, but I always say that we have 25 guys that\u2019ll leave this rink with a black eye,\u201d Hagel said. \u201cWhen you have 25 of those guys in your dressing room you\u2019re probably in a good spot. It\u2019s about setting the tone and trying to let us set the series up instead of letting someone else dictate it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hagel had a monster shift in the second period where he hit everything in sight in the Montreal zone and ended up scoring what at the time gave the Lightning a 2-1 lead. It was vintage Hagel. He added a power-play goal in the third period to tie the game 3-3.<\/p>\n
Hedman update<\/p>\n
Lightning captain Victor Hedman skated with the scratches during the team\u2019s optional Sunday morning skate in his last step in ramping it up in an effort to eventually return to play. Cooper, however, was hesitant pre-game to pinpoint what Hedman skating Sunday meant in the process.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt just means he\u2019s just progressing,\u201d Cooper said. \u201cYou know, it\u2019s going to be tough \u2026 as coaches, you\u2019re not trying to hide anything or anything like that, in the end 20 guys are going to go out and play, same with Montreal. But when you get to this point and guys get banged up, and then there\u2019s always that, \u2018How close is he? How close is he?\u2019 Sometimes you just don\u2019t have answers. \u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cThis time of year, yeah we love seeing guys skate and stuff like that, but that still could mean they\u2019re three weeks away. Or you can be like (Ottawa\u2019s) Thomas Chabot and break your wrist and be right back. You just never know.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cooper finished that thought by saying he won\u2019t really be able to comment much on injuries, Hedman or otherwise, given the time of year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TAMPA \u2014 From his very first shift of Game 1 against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Sunday, Montreal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":556478,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[462],"tags":[5,21,4,465,466,92],"class_list":{"0":"post-556477","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl-draft","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-montreal-canadiens","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-nhl-draft","12":"tag-nhl-entry-draft","13":"tag-tampa-bay-lightning"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116434711010944981","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556477","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=556477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556477\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/556478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=556477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=556477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=556477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}