Montreal Canadiens 5-4 New York ‘LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LAAAAAFONTAAAINE’ Islanders
Perhaps it’s only fitting that on this, the 100th year in the history of the Montreal Canadiens, that the team came up with another memorable come-back against another team from New York.
Being on the wrong end of a 4-1 scoreline going into the third period, the Habs found another gear and scored 4 goals in the final 20 to finally take it by a score of 5-4.
It all started so promisingly for Montreal though, when Tomas Plekanec zoomed down the left wing and found Alex Kovalev in the crease who had no trouble beating former Habs netminder Yann Danis with a nice 5 hole. That was all the Habs could muster up until their 3rd period heroics though, as the Islanders poured on the pressure and it paid off.
First it was Mark Streit (who else) who opened the scoring for the Long Island team with a shot from the point on the power-play. A couple of minutes later, Jon Sim had Carey Price to thank when his seemingly harmless shot somehow found its way under Price’s pad and into the back of the net to give the Isles a 2-1 lead.
In the second period, the Habs’ defensive woes kept showcasing themselves when Bill Guerin found himself open in the crease to redirect Mark Streit’s shot past the young Montreal goaltender and give his team a two goal edge. Frans Nielsen thought he had surely won it for his team when he scored New York’s 4th and final goal with about 3 minutes to go in the middle period.
It was a whole different story in the third though, as only 8 minutes in the under-fire Tomas Plekanec took advantage of a rebound from linemate Kovalev’s shot and put his second of the season into the net. A huge pressure-reliever, it didn’t take him long to add another to his tally. Andrei Kostitsyn was his accomplice this time around, squaring the puck to him in the crease after deking the defenseman and Plekanec scored to put his team within one of tying the game.
And who else but Long Island native Chris Higgins to tie the game? The Yale graduate had Saku Koivu to thank after the captain’s excellent play against the boards, who passed the puck to Higgins who took a quick wrister which beat Danis to level it at 4 all.
And with less than 5 minutes left, Alex Kovalev won it for his team by deflecting a point shot by Andrei Markov for his second goal of the game, and the Canadiens’ 5th and most important marker. As the seconds winded down, Carey Price made amends for his earlier debacle by making a string of extremely crucial saves to conserve his team’s lead and new-found confidence, and that was all she wrote from UnionDale.
No Comments
No comments yet.
Comments RSS TrackBack Identifier URI
Leave a comment
