Cornwall ON – Max Pacioretty wanted Top Six minutes in the NHL and he got them last night vs Philadelphia. Montreal lost 5-3. It was a critical game. If you listened to the media, like team990 in Montreal there was a lot of chatter about PK Subban vs Mike Richards, but there weren’t a lot of calls because Philly is a very good team which was busy putting points up on the board.
Jeff Carter had a goal and 2 assists leading the way and James Van Riemsdyk had 2 goals.
The good news for Montreal was that Scott Gomez had his game on or Pacioretty really did help as number 11 notched 2 assists. PK had a goal and an assist and Lars Ellers came up pointless with his dad in attendance to watch his son LIVE at a NHL game for the first time.
If Montreal wants to sip from the Cup this season they’re going to have to figure out how to beat a very strong Flyers team. One way will be to draw more penalties. For Montreal to really put their power play into high gear it needs much more work. When the most time on the pp is about 2 minutes on a night it’s going to be hard to win.
It means the forwards are going to have to be more aggressive and go more to those areas of the ice that draw more penalties.
They also have to score the 1st goal more often. A tendency to give up the first goal the last few games has led to a mini losing streak.
In other NHL scores The Canucks nipped Columbus 3-2 in OT; Tomas Fleischmann notched a hat trick against Chicago as the Avs knocked off the Hawks 4-3 with Ryan O’Byrne picking up an assist.
Nashville upset San Jose 3-2; Carolina edged Florida 4-3; Viktor Hedman scored the shoot out winner for Tampa Bay in their 2-1 win over Atlanta; Nik Lidstrom needed an empty netter as he notched a rare hat trick for the future Hall of Famer in Detroits 5-2 win over St. Louis.
Anaheim beat Washington 2-1 in OT; the Rangers scored 4 in the 3rd to surprise the Penguins 4-1 in Pittsburgh; Marty Brodeur notched a shut out and Ilya Kovalchuk scored 2 goals as the Devils beat Phoenix 3-0; and Drew Stafford’s Hat Trick was just the tonic as the Sabres shut out Boston 3-0.
