The NHL saw a second goalie fight in as many weeks, and THN decided to dive in the Montreal Canadiens' history to see if there were some memorable goalie fights in recent memory.
Goalie fights seem to be all the rage in the NHL these days. On January 19, Sergei Bobrovsky and Alex Nedeljkovic dropped the gloves in a match between the Florida Panthers and the San Jose Sharks; on the following day, it was the talk of the virtual town that is the internet. Then, on Sunday, with his team down 5-2 against the Boston Bruins, Tampa Bay Lightning netminder Andrei Vasilevskiy decided to try to wake up his team by fighting Jeremy Swayman. The Bolts’ netminder had the upper hand, and the tide turned after the bout, with the Florida outfit completing the comeback for a 6-5 overtime win.
After seeing two goalie fights break out in the last two weeks and seeing the reaction to the event, it’s clear that fans and media alike enjoy seeing netminders drop the gloves. Still, it generally remains a rare feat in the Montreal Canadiens’ game. There was nearly one back in November 2023 when the Habs were taking on the Bruins at the Bell Centre, when Swayman, who had lost his mask following a scrum around his net, stared at Samuel Montembeault at the other end of the ice and extended a challenge, but the Becancour native declined the invite.
It wouldn’t have been the first time a goalie fight broke out in a Canadiens-Bruins match, though. In February 2011, a young Carey Price took on Tim Thomas after the Bruins goalie skated the length of the ice to stop Price from getting involved in the scrum around his net. It wasn’t much of a fight in the end, but the gloves and masks came off as the two goalies tried to exchange punches at center ice before falling to the ice. The Habs’ netminder said afterwards that they were play-fighting more than anything else.
Price could have been involved in another one when he lost his cool and punched Kyle Palmieri with his blocker in a game against the New Jersey Devils on December 9, 2016, but their respective teammates and the referees jumped in to stop him. Cory Schneider who had started skating towards the Canadiens’ net retreated to his own cage and Price picked up a four-minute penalty for roughing.
But there was one time when a Canadiens goaltender was involved in a real fight: during the Good Friday Massacre. On April 20, 1984, the Habs were taking on the Quebec Nordiques in the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs, and there was no love lost between the provincial rivals. No less than 14 fights broke out in that game, one of which included each team’s backup netminder: Richard Sevigny for the Sainte-Flanelle, and Clint Malarchuk for the Nordiques.
Given Montembeault’s reaction to Swayman’s invite in 2023, it would be surprising to see the Quebec drop the gloves in the future, but given how Jakub Dobes plays the game, it wouldn’t be shocking if he did. The 24-year-old is quite aggressive in net and doesn’t shy away from discreetly hitting rivals with his stick at times, and he does get involved in trash-talking. In last year’s series against the Washington Capitals, it was his trash-talking that led to the Caps getting in his way as he tried to exit the ice at the end of the second period, which led to the famous Josh Anderson-Tom Wilson fight in the visitors’ bench.
While fights aren’t everybody’s cup of tea, there’s no denying that goalie fights are generally very well-received by fans and that their teammates seem to enjoy them as well.
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