Player introductions in a cascade of lights, with screaming fans in a full building. And they did the wave. And they chanted.
Yes, the Stanley Cup playoffs are now looking and sounding like the Stanley Cup playoffs, and that meant the Montreal Canadiens were up against a full house.
But though they’ve beaten the odds in the eyes of many just by making it to the third round, they couldn’t beat the Vegas Golden Knights.
Goals by Nick Holden, Shea Theodore, Mattias Janmark and Alec Martinez led the Knights to a 4-1 win Monday at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, and a 1-0 lead in their best-of-seven Stanley Cup semifinal. It was Vegas’s fifth straight win.
Rookie Cole Caufield scored for Montreal, which suffered its first loss in eight games dating back to Game 4 against Toronto in the first round.
Carey Price kept his team in it with a couple of riveting saves in the second period: one on Mark Stone, the other robbing Jonathan Marchessault. TV cameras caught Price winking after catching Stone’s one-timer, much like another Habs legendary goalie, Patrick Roy, did to Tomas Sandstrom in Montreal’s 1993 Cup run.
But that was the brightest part of Montreal’s first game in a week.
- Opening Fleury: The Canadiens came out flying and dominated the first 10 minutes or so, but couldn’t get anything past Marc-André Fleury, the three-time Cup champion who grew up a fan of the team he was now facing.
Vegas scored first on a Theodore slapshot off a faceoff win and the Knights led 1-0 after 20 minutes. It marked the first time in 447 minutes, dating back to Montreal’s Game 4 loss to the Maple Leafs, that the Canadiens had trailed in a series.
- Goal Caufield: The Knights held a 3-1 lead through two periods, on goals by Martinez and Janmark. In between was a goal by Caufield, with his parents in the stands and his brother wearing a “Goal Caufield” T-shirt.
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It was Caufield’s first goal of the post-season but 40th in a year that started in college and also featured stints with the United States at the world juniors and Laval of the AHL.
The Habs are counting a great deal on Caufield, with coach Dominique Ducharme hoping one goal would lead to more.
“Sometimes goal scorers like him put one in and they can go on a roll for five, six, seven games,” Ducharme said before the game. “We see it with Tyler (Toffoli). He didn’t score early in the playoffs against Toronto, and then once he got going he’s been on a hot streak. I think the same thing can happen with Cole.”
- Full house: It was the first time since March 7, 2020 that the Canadiens had played in the U.S. It was also the first time they’d played before a packed house since the pandemic struck 15 months ago. The Canadiens have been playing before 2,500 fans at home since Game 6 of the first round. The Knights’ capacity grew at T-Mobile as the playoffs went on.
“Besides the crowd, there’s not much difference,” Ducharme said. “We’ve been a good road team. We feel comfortable playing on the road. It’s a different situation with the crowd, being a full building. That’s something we haven’t seen in a while. Again, we have a lot of experienced guys on our team.”
The Canadiens indeed won five of six road games through the first two series, though only once faced a road crowd and it was only 550, at Scotiabank Arena in Game 7 of the first round.
- Tale of two teams: It was billed as modern versus tradition. The Golden Knights are the NHL’s newest team, though soon to be supplanted by the Seattle Kraken. They joined the NHL in 2017, built on a generous expansion draft and cunning moves by the front office. The Canadiens are the oldest professional hockey team, born in 1909 and one of the NHL’s founding members (1917). They didn’t meet this season, of course, because of travel restrictions during the pandemic. But they met six times previously, with Montreal owning a 5-1 edge.
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- Not even close: If the regular season matters, the series shouldn’t be close. The Golden Knights led the NHL in wins (40) and goal differential (plus-67), and tied for the lead in points (82) with Colorado, though the Avalanche were awarded the Presidents’ Trophy based on regulation wins. Among the 16 playoff teams, Montreal had the fewest wins (24) and points (59) and worst goal differential (minus-9) during the regular season.
- Injury report: Montreal was missing defencemen Jeff Petry (hand) and Jon Merrill (undisclosed), and forward Jake Evans (concussion). Ducharme expects all three back at some point this series, with Petry likely first. For Vegas, forwards Tomas Nosek (undisclosed) and Peyton Krebs (broken jaw) remained sidelined.
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Carey Price and the Canadiens no match for Golden Knights in Stanley Cup semifinal opener - Toronto Star
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