Montreal Canadiens 6-2 New York ‘Ok seriously, we’re starting to fucken hate this arena’ Rangers
TopShelf’s completely Professional Game-Report:
Andrei Kostitsyn scored for the 3rd game in a row, Carey Price made 18 saves and the Montreal Canadiens won a 3rd straight outing, disposing of the Conference-leading New York Rangers 6-2 on Thursday night at the Bell Centre.
The lines were kept intact by head coach Guy Carbonneau after Tuesday night’s victory against the Atlanta Thrashers, and it paid dividents right away.
The first puck had been dropped for barely 10 minutes when Matt D’Agostini made a nice pass to the elder Kostitsyn who managed to tip the puck over a sprawling Henrik Lundqvist. Defenseman Andrei Markov also got his 15th assist of the seaon on the play.
Less than a minute later, Montreal’s 4th line - which has been having a very good couple of games - added to their offensive resumes by scoring to put their team 2 goals up. Georges Laraque poked the puck at his own blue line which went to Maxim Lapierre. The St Leonard native was then off to the races and when the Rangers defenseman commited too early by sliding to block the pass, Lapierre took the puck around him and squared it to linemate Steve Begin who had the easy task of putting his stick on the puck for his 4th goal of the season.
The Canadiens kept on coming, and Alex Tanguay scored his 9th with his new team when he shot the puck and it went off the out-of-position netminder’s back. Lundqvist complained to no avail that Tom Kostopoulos interfered with the play, but the referee wasn’t having any of it and the Habs quickly found themselves 3 goals up.
But unlike Tuesday’s game against Atlanta, they didn’t sit on their lead. Instead, they added to the Rangers’ woes by adding another goal. The 4th line again flexed their offensive muscles by combining for their second goal of the contest. Three minutes into the middle period, Georges Laraque controlled the puck at the point then slipped it to a wide open Begin behind the New York defense. Begin took the shot but Lundqvist made the save, only for Lapierre to bury the rebound for his second point of the night.
The Rangers had some offense in them however, and Markus Naslund made sure his team wasn’t going to be shutout when he deflected Paul Mara’s point shot for his 10th of the season.
Five minutes later, Nigel Dawes skated into the Montreal zone with speed and got his team within two by completing a nice pass by Nikolai Zherdev.
But if the Rangers had hopes for a comeback, the Habs dashed them before they began when Robert Lang cashed in on a beautiful passing play by Alex Kovalev and Andrei Markov. All Lang had to do was tap the puck in at the doorstep.
And then Matt D’Agostini added salt to the Rangers’ wounds by scoring for the second game in a row with a beautiful wrist-shot that caught the New York goaltender completely offguard.
With the victory, the Canadiens move within 4 points of the Rangers but have 4 games in hand.
TopShelf’s notes o’ da day:
-When you work hard, good things happen. When you put traffic in front of the opposing team’s goalie, good things happen. When you drive to the net, good things happen.
-If I were D’Agostini, I’d hire a bodyguard. Sergei Kostitsyn’s got fire in them eyes.
-With that said, Sergei has the talent to come back. He just needs to play with the same drive he did last season.
-I don’t understand how people can say bad things about Steve Begin. Is it the bald spot? Love me some bald spots!
-Andrei Kostitsyn has to keep playing the way he’s playing. He has to keep using his speed and cashing in on the chances he gets.
-Alex Kovalev cannot score at a Vietnamese brothel right now.
-Price & Halak should stick with that brown gear for the rest of the season. It just looks awesome.
-Wasn’t it a treat to watch their respective teams’ tough guys in Saku Koivu and Scott Gomez drop the gloves? I clearly saw half a punch fly in there somewhere.
-Gorgeous Gorges bodychecking Price at the end was…priceless. I guess that’s my best shit right there.
-D’Agostini - Koivu - A. Kostitsyn = Sexy.
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