In New York, Cole Caufield scored just ahead of the midway point of the third period on Sunday to give the Montreal Canadiens a 2-1 lea over the New York Rangers.
“There was an opportunity for him tonight, and obviously he seized it,” Canadiens coach Martin St. Louis said. “He was a big player for us tonight. I thought we played hard in front of him. Obviously, he has to correct the last mistakes we made, and they brought a lot of shots.
“I’m not sure what the chances finished after the game, but after two the chances were pretty even and both teams had, so to speak, a power-play goal. Theirs was 6-on-5. So, it was a good battle and in the third period, we found a way to get another goal, and then we did a pretty good job of shutting them down.”
There was no last second heroics from the Rangers, who had their seven-game streak snapped in a 2-1 loss.
Sam Montembeault made 39 saves in the Habs win.
“I felt from start to finish we were very engaged physically, mentally,” St. Louis said. “It’s one of those games where you’re coming into this building, they’re 13-2-2 in their last 17, they’ve been waiting for you. The game is at 5, a quick turnaround, we’re on a back to back, our injuries, it seemed like before the puck dropped you have an uphill battle.
“I just felt we came in tonight and we didn’t focus on all of the excuses we had to not give it our all. Just a gutsy win. By no means was it perfect, but the engagement was an all-time high for our team this season.”
The Canadiens moved to 18-23-3.
“I’m always ready in those situations,” Caufield said. “You’ve got to capitalize on their mistakes, and we did that there.”
Artemi Panarin was the lone striker for the Rangers, his goal second period goal tied the game, 1-1.
“The energy level didn’t look great, so whether it’s that or not, I don’t know,” Rangers Gerard Gallant said. “I’m not going to yell at them, scream at them with what’s going on. We were hoping they were going to have some good jump. Look, it was a pretty even game. They got one bounce they beat us to. It wasn’t awful, but we expect better from our group.”
New York dropped to 24-13-7.
“A little bit more sloppy than what we want, but their goalie made some good saves,” New York captain Jacob Trouba said. “It was a pretty even game. I think we played a pretty solid game, too, but got a little bit sloppy.”
Kirby Dach s scored an early second period power play goal to give Montreal a 1-0 lead.
“Both games (against the Islanders and Rangers) we played pretty good goalies, and you know it’s not going to be a shootout, you’re going to have to end up scoring one or two and playing good defensively in a good team-structured game,” Dach said. “That’s what it came down to, and it’s nice to be rewarded.”
Igor Shesterkin made 29 save in the Rangers loss.
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