Canadiens Come Up Short Against the Islanders | RECAP: MTL @ NYI

Forwards

22 Cole Caufield - 14 Nick Suzuki - 20 Juraj Slafkovsky
11 Brendan Gallagher - 15 Alex Newhook - 40 Joel Armia
70 Tanner Pearson - 71 Jake Evans - 17 Josh Anderson
55 Michael Pezzetta - 28 Christian Dvorak - 49 Rafael Harvey-Pinard

Defensemen
8 Mike Matheson - 58 David Savard
54 Jordan Harris - 26 Johnathan Kovacevic
47 Jayden Struble - 52 Justin Barron

Goaltenders

Starter: 35 Sam Montembeault
Alternate: 30 Cayden Primeau

Out of the lineup

Scratches: Jesse Ylonen, Colin White
Injuries: Carey Price (knee), Chris Wideman (back), Kirby Dach (knee), Joshua Roy (hand), Arber Xhekaj (upper body), Kaiden Guhle (upper body)

With Patrick Roy behind the bench, the New York Islanders are playing their best hockey of the season, winners of eight of their last 10 games and solidifying their hold on a playoff spot in the Metropolitan division. In short the Islanders are playing with a purpose. 

That's a murky concept for the Canadiens. It's not easy for an athlete to rally around the concept of playing spoiler. 

The direction of the two clubs was painfully obvious in this game. New York was carrying the play, forcing turnovers and arriving first on pucks. The Canadiens struggled to mount any measure of attack. They were thoroughly outplayed in this game.

Montreal averaged less than five shots per period. High danger scoring chances were 21-4 (5 vs 5) for the Isles.

That said, the Canadiens were opportunistic, with Jordan Harris opening the scoring before the end of the first period. New York tied the game in the middle frame with Pierre Engvall with a shot that zipped past Sam Montembeault's glove.

Cole Caufield recorded his 25th goal of the season before four minutes were gone in the third period. Less than three minutes later, Casey Cizikas beat Montembeault with a wraparound goal to bring the teams even again.

Kyle Palmieri ended the contest with a shot over the shoulder of Montembeault just 1:17 into overtime.

New York never led in this game until the game winner. Oddly, the Isles led for zero seconds in the three game series this season against Montreal.

It was the sixth straight win for the Islanders.

Canadiens (30-36-12)
Shots: 14
Face-off %: 45.8
Power play: 0/0
Penalty minutes: 13
Hits: 21
Blocks: 21

Islanders (36-27-15)
Shots: 31
Face-off %: 54.2
Power play: 0/4
Penalty minutes: 5
Hits: 22
Blocks: 10

Canadiens Scorers
1st period: Harris (3)
2nd period: --
3rd period: Caufield (25)
OT: --
SO: --

Islanders Scorers
1st period: --
2nd period: Engvall (10)
3rd period: Cizikas (9)
OT: Palmieri (28)
SO: --

Goaltenders
MTL: Montembeault (OTL) 16-15-8
NYI: Varlamov (W) 13-8-4

Jordan Harris - Harris scored his third goal of the game and led all Habs defensemen with four blocked shots in almost 20 minutes of ice time.

Martin St. Louis

“We couldn't execute plays tonight like we're capable of. Our execution was there from time to time, but not with enough consistency."

Brendan Gallagher

“They were better than us. We tried to play with the same sense of urgency, but we couldn't do it. They were the first on the puck. They created more scoring chances and they were always on us in coverage."

The Canadiens and Senators are jockeying for the fifth best odds at winning the draft lottery. The two teams will meet in Kanata on Saturday night.

Be sure to bookmark THN.com/Montreal for year-round coverage of the Montreal Canadiens, Laval Rocket, and Habs prospects playing in leagues around the world.