MONTREAL, QUEBEC – Montreal are one of the most famous and storied teams in all of hockey, but few post season runs can match the nature of their 2010 campaign. The Canadiens just keep coming back when it appears the proverbial fat lady isn’t so much warming up, but already in to her first verse!
After a stunning comeback in the first round to knock top seeds Washington out, the Canadiens faced defending Stanley Cup champions Pittsburgh. With barely 48 hours between the end of the Capitals series and the start of their match up with the Pens, Montreal was easily beaten by Crosby and co in game 1. Some felt the Habs were perhaps now out of steam, that the Washington series had taken too much out of them to cope with the Penguins. Losing superstar defenseman Andrei Markov to injury, and seeing their near perfect penalty kill record destroyed as the Pens grabbed 4 powerplay goals in 4 attempts, only further fanned the flames that the Habs time was up. But once more the Habs and Jaroslav Halak bounced back!
Halak, pulled in game 1, found his rhythm again and Mike Cammalleri grabbed his seventh and eighth goals of the post season to propel the Habs to a 3-1 win over a lacklustre Penguins. Rookie PK Subban continued his impressive run of form, having first been called up to cover Jaroslav Spacek’s absence, Subban stepped in to the line up once again in Markov’s absence, and again barely put a foot wrong. Markov is out indefinitely with a lower body injury so the youngster will be looked too again to continue his series of strong performances so far during the post season.
The series now moves to Montreal for games 3 and 4, and the Canadiens faithful will be harbouring hopes of another major upset. Cammalleri’s timely run of form, combined with Halak’s often superb play, has propelled Montreal forward after the team only just scrapped in to the post season on the last day of the regular season, beating the Rangers to 8th spot by a single point. Only Joe Pavelski of San Jose has more goals than Cammalleri, and the former LA and Calgary forward has 5 assists to lead the Canadiens in scoring with 13 points during the play-offs. Halak’s play was the big story of the first round, seeing off Washington’s all star offence in 7 games, and the young Slovak still maintains a .931 save percentage, having seen nearly 300 shots in the 8 games he has featured in so far.
With Boston or Philadelphia awaiting the series winners in the Conference Finals, Pittsburgh are favourites to advance and take a third straight trip to the Stanley Cup Finals. But they know getting a result at the Bell Centre will not be easy. The Penguins will look to star forwards Sidney Crosby, who leads all skaters with 5 goals and 16 points during the post season, and last years Conn Smythe winner Evgeni Malkin to step up this week and guide the team through two tricky games in Quebec. The Pens must also contend with the loss of Jordan Staal, who left game 1 with an injury following a collision with Subban, as he is sidelined with a foot injury. Staal is listed as day to day after cutting a tendon on the top of his foot
Contact the author: rob.mcgregor@prohockeynews.com
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