Canadiens @ Ducks Top Six Minutes: Another spoiled comeback

First period

• The Anaheim Ducks beat Samuel Montembeault 20 seconds into the game. Montreal challenges the play for offside, and it is determined that Chris Kreider was an inch offside on the play. The Habs get saved on this occasion.
• So Anaheim gets a shot on its next shift, and it also beats Montembeault. There’s nothing to save him this time.
• We’ve played 61 seconds of this game, and the puck has been in a net three times. The third time it’s Nick Suzuki who finds the mesh to tie the game.

Barn burner brewing here. Cole Caufield finds Nick Suzuki in the slot, and the #Habs score on their first shot of the game as well.

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— Matt Drake (@drakemt.bsky.social) March 6, 2026 at 10:18 PM

• The two goalies are sporting save percentages of .000 so far.
• It took a minute for each of Suzuki, Cole Caufield, and Juraj Slafkovský to record a point in their reunion.
• Jake Evans almost set up a second goal, but Zachary Bolduc sent his feed from below the goal line wide of the net.
• Leo Carlsson trips Kaiden Guhle in the offensive zone, and Montreal has a chance to take the lead.
• And they make that happen. Lane Hutson takes Montreal’s second shot of the game, and it’s a second goal.

Lane Hutson walks down from the point and gets a member’s bounce to make it 2-1 #Habs

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— Matt Drake (@drakemt.bsky.social) March 6, 2026 at 10:23 PM

• We might need to replace the red lights tonight.
• Hutson is now tied for 11th in goal-scoring by defencemen with his 11th of the season.
• Lukas Dostal makes his first save on another dangerous chance from Montreal.
• Montembeault is about to be tested on a power play as Alexandre Carrier goes to the box.
• The Ducks get the puck to the slot with Montembeault out of position, but they somehow can’t knock it into the empty net.
• A point shot from Radko Gudas goes right over the glove and past Montembeault to tie the game because he simply can’t see the puck that far away.
• Despite the start and getting outshot 12-4, the Canadiens go to the intermission with a 2-0 lead. They won’t win this game if they play the same way for the next 40 minutes, however.

Second period

• Dostal doesn’t look comfortable with the puck coming toward. If Montreal could manage more than four shots….
• The Habs are forcing the Ducks into a lot of icings to begin this period, which is encouraging.
• The new third line does well to get the puck in and work it low for a couple of scoring chances. Zachary Bolduc has been much more involved since being scratched. Dach drew an interference penalty on the shift.
• The Ducks overcommit on a short-handed rush and that leaves a two-on-one for Slafkovský and Caufield. Slafkovský saucers the puck into Caufield’s sweet spot, but Dostal read the play and was ready for the one-timer.
• The return of Newhook, and Bolduc playing better, allowed the second unit to look almost as creative and dangerous as the first.
• Jacob Trouba cross-checks Jake Evans at the blue line as he’s waiting to relay the puck out, and that will be another Montreal power play.
• Not nearly as dangerous on the man advantage that time.
• The fourth line spends a shift in the offensive zone, but it ends with Anderson getting called for interference as he finishes a check on Rado Gudas a couple of seconds after he made a pass. That wouldn’t be called in the playoffs, but was unnecessary with how Montreal was hemming Anaheim in.
• It’s just what the Ducks needed after having nothing going in the period at all. They score on another long-range shot that Montembeault didn’t track, coming off the stick of Jackson LaCombe.
• Demidov gets a breakaway and dekes Dostal flat on the ice, but his shot is stuffed into Dostal’s pad.
• Another great shift from Bolduc takes a potential rush from Anaheim and turns it into offensive-zone time. This is the player Kent Hughes traded for.
• Suddenly Montembeault is the reason why Anaheim doesn’t have a fourth goal. Some sloppy play from the top line allows three scoring chances for the Ducks.
• Montreal goes back to work in the offensive zone after the goal and headless play that tends to follow for a couple of shifts.
• Jake Evans is playing in Anderson’s spot on the fourth line. Martin St-Louis clearly isn’t happy with that interference penalty, which has resulted in the Habs trailing heading into the final period.
• It was by far a better period for the Canadiens, and yet they were outscored. They just have to stick with the plan and stay out of the box in the third to have a chance.

Third period

• It takes 35 seconds for Anaheim to add a fourth goal as Hutson is stripped of the puck in the neutral zone, Noah Dobson can’t cut the pass across the top of the crease, and Carlsson scores.
• The Canadiens now have four players in the slot trying to prevent a puck from reaching Montembeault. It’s going to be hard to create offence from that formation.
• Caufield, who was visibly frustrated with the fourth goal against and an errant pass early in the period, takes his anger out on the puck, blasting it in to make the deficit one goal.

Cole Caufield on the one-timer and it is once again a one goal game in Anaheim

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— Scott Matla (@scottmatla.bsky.social) March 7, 2026 at 12:17 AM

• Montembeault makes not a confident save, but an important one as he recovers after sliding too far out of his crease to deny a shot from the slot.
• It had been a while, but Carrier shows off his elite shooting ability to tie the game. He flags down a puck in the high slot and sends it through a screen past the glove of Dostal to tie the game.

And it’s another Habs comeback in California…Alexandre Carrier gets one through traffic to tie it up 4-4

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— Scott Matla (@scottmatla.bsky.social) March 7, 2026 at 12:25 AM

• It’s a second straight multi-goal third-period comeback. Now to avoid the late penalty this time.
• Noah Dobson shoots on the next shift, and Cole Caufield tips in his second of the period to put Montreal in the lead.

COLE CAUFIELD GIVES THE HABS THE LEAD

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— Scott Matla (@scottmatla.bsky.social) March 7, 2026 at 12:28 AM

• There are a lot of Habs fans in Anaheim, and they’ve begun singing “Olé!”
• Dach holds the puck deep behind Anaheim’s net, dodging defenders like a matador to kill a good 20 seconds. Keeping the puck as far away from their net is the best defence they can play.
• With 41 seconds to play, a point shot is tipped by Kreider, and the game is tied at five.
• The game should be over, but instead we’re headed to overtime. At least the point combined with Detroit’s loss earlier moves the Habs within a point of third in the Atlantic. They can take that spot with the extra point in OT.

Overtime

• Montreal takes the opening possession.
• Demidov gets his second breakaway of the game. Dostal denies him with the glove.
• Slafkovský goes in alone. Another Dostal save on a five-hole attempt. He has all the spaced covered in one-on-one situations.
• Hutson dangles to get some space to break out and gets tripped by Olen Zellweger with 2:01 to play. The best possible chance now to end this game.
• Dostal is all over another Caufield one-timer.
• Slafkovský’s stick shatters on a one-time attempt, and that will do it for the overtime period, with the chance squandered.

Shootout

• Carlsson goes first. He dekes himself right out of a shooting angle.
• Caufield goes in slow, telegraphs a shot, and creates an easy save for Dostal. I don’t get that attempt.
• Montembeault denies the next attempt.
• Suzuki’s backhand deke is stuffed into Dostal. Another slow attempt that I don’t understand.
• McTavish fakes a couple of shots, then fires the puck wide.
• Dach comes out with the game on his stick. He tries the same backhand deke as Suzuki and Dostal makes the same save.
• Cutter Gauthier fires a quick shot five-hole and gives his team the edge in the fourth round.
• Demidov gets a third one-on-one versus Dostal. He makes this one count with a sharp writer.
• Kreider half turns as if he’s going backhand and goes to his forehand instead. Montembeault reads it.
• Hutson now has the chance to win it. He dekes too close to Dostal and gets pokechecked.
• Killorn winds up a shot on his hip and rips it past the blocker of Montembeault.
• Oliver Kapanen comes out to keep the Habs in it. He’s stopped. Just the single point for Montreal tonight, and so far on this road trip.
• There’s one more game left on this journey tomorrow night in Los Angeles. That will have to be a win to salvage this trip and return home with any sort of confidence in their play.

EOTP 3 Stars

3) Take that, Jake Allen

2) I’ll take a team that tries

1) Apropos of nothing