In Montreal, Chris Kreider scored his third of the season in the first period, and Alexis Lafreniere scored his first of the campaign in the third period to help the New York 
Rangers to a 3-1 win over the Canadiens on Saturday night.
“Obviously to score in Montreal, it’s pretty fun,” Lafreniere said. “The team played well. You know, a great effort, and obviously a nice pass by Mika on the goal. It’s hard to imagine anything better. It was a really nice effort by the whole team.”
The goal came off a 2-on-1 with Mika Zibanejad passing across the slot to the streaking Lafreniere.
“He’s still a really young kid but he’s a talented kid, and we asked him to play a better two-way game and he’s responded to that,” Rangers head coach Gerard Gallant said. “He created three or four chances tonight. He scored a nice goal, he had some other chances, so we really like the progress from training camp until right now.”
The Rangers opened the season with a sticker, played well against the Dallas Stars, but lost; and finally put a complete game together in Montreal for the win.
Lafreniere scored off speed, Kreider scored off a deflection near the crease.
Igor Shesterkin made 31 saves for the victory.
Jonathan Drouin scored the Habs’ lone goal in the middle frame to tie the game at 1-1.
“We’re playing outside a little bit too much,” Drouin said. “Today, there were a lot of rebounds from that goalie. He played well, but a lot of rebounds laying in the slot, laying around the net, and not a lot of guys to capitalize on those rebounds or get that dirty goal right now.”
Montreal has lost all three games they have played so far this season.
“It’s not just one thing,” Canadiens head coach Dominique Ducharme said. “First, we have to be more dynamic offensively, like we were in the third period. Second, we have to have more of a presence in front of the net. There were times in the second period when one of our players had the puck, but he had to wait for a teammate to go to the net.”
The Rangers moved to 1-1-1.
“To come outside of the U.S. and come here and play a Saturday night in Montreal you know it’s going to be an electric atmosphere, and it certainly was today,” Zibanejad said. “But it’s good to leave here with a win.”
Kevin Rooney iced the win for New York with an empty-net goal with 10 seconds left on the clock.
Jake Allen made 21 saves in the loss.
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