In Montreal, the Canadiens built a 3-0 lead into the middle frame on Saturday night then took the rest of the evening off as the Dallas Stars rallied to force extra time then win it in the extra session, 4-3.
Tyler Seguin struck for his second goal of the night with 2:08 left in OT for the win.
“We’ve been pumping his tires for a couple of weeks about all the good things he does to help us win,” Stars head coach Rick Bowness said. “And the last couple of games, it’s the goal-scoring that’s helped us win. So even without those two goals, you saw him battling in the offensive zone, he’s playing very hard. He’s leading by example. There’s a lot of passion in his game right now.
“This is probably the best we’ve seen him playing for a long stretch of time, so give him kudos and give him credit, because when you’re a goal-scorer and you’re not scoring, there’s a lot of noise around you and it’s easy to get distracted. So we’re very proud of how he’s handled that whole scenario and just kept plugging away, and it’s nice to see him be rewarded tonight.”
Ben Bishop made 29 saves to get the win.
Joel Armia, Jordan Weal and Nick Cousins scored for the Habs to get the 3-0 lead.
“We’re up 3-0, we’re playing well, we make a bad mistake in giving them the puck on that first goal,” Canadiens head coach Claude Julien said. “But in those situations after that we could have had power plays. It was such a poorly managed game, let’s put it that way.”
Blake Comeau and Mattias Janmark had single markers for the Stars.
“We’ve been doing it all season, so I don’t think there’s any doubt in this room whenever we get down,” Bishop said. “It’s kind of the way we play and always stick to our systems. They got a couple of lucky bounces there to get their goals, and I don’t think anybody was too worried. We were playing good. Obviously, they came at us pretty hot there at the beginning, but I thought we did a good job the rest of the game.”
[WATCH: All Stars vs. Canadiens highlights]
Carey Price made 22 saves in the loss.
“I think they just grabbed a lot of momentum and that carried on in the game,” Price said. “I thought we played a very excellent third period and deserved a better third than that.”
You must be logged in to post a comment.