Game Preview: Pittsburgh Penguins @ Montreal Canadiens 12/12/2024

The Pens head north to meet the Canadiens

Who: Pittsburgh Penguins (12-14-4, 28 points, 7th place Metropolitan Division) @ Montreal Canadiens (11-14-3 25 points, 8th place Atlantic Division)

When: 7 p.m. ET

How to Watch: Local broadcast on SportsNet Pittsburgh, TSN2 up in Canada, streaming on ESPN+

Pens’ Path Ahead: The Pens take the quick jaunt from Montreal over to Ottawa for a game on Saturday night against the Senators. The Tues-Thurs-Sat pattern of games continues next week when Pittsburgh hosts Los Angeles before hitting the road for stops in Nashville and New Jersey.

Opponent Track: This is Game No. 5 on the Habs’ current home-stand and don’t look now but they’re 3-1-0 in it so far. The margins have been small —recent wins have included an OT victory against NYI and a shootout win against Anaheim on Monday in Montreal’s last game — but they’ve belied their last place status with some victories as of late.

Season Series: Break out the brooms (then again, maybe not) because the Penguins are going for a season-sweep tonight. Pittsburgh has already defeated Montreal by scores of 6-3 back on Oct. 14th and 3-1 on Nov. 2nd. Tonight is the third and final PIT/MTL game of the year.

Hidden Stat: Pittsburgh has points in 10 consecutive visits to the Bell Centre (7-0-3).

Getting to know les Canadiens

Projected lines

FORWARDS

Cole Caufield - Nick Suzuki - Alex Newhook

Juraj Slafkovsky - Kirby Dach - Patrik Laine

Josh Anderson - Christian Dvorak - Brendan Gallagher

Emil Heineman - Jake Evans - Joel Armia

DEFENSEMEN

Lane Hutson / Mike Matheson

Kaiden Guhle / Justin Barron

Arber Xhekaj / David Savard

Goalies: Samuel Montembeault named tonight’s starter (Cayden Primeau backup)

IR: Carey Price

Potential Scratches: Michael Pezzetta, Jayden Struble

—Now that Laine is back from his preseason knee injury this healthy Montreal lineup looks...pretty formidable? It won’t challenge for a championship but there are some nice pieces in place looking at the first couple of forward lines. No wonder they’re 3-1 in the four games Laine has been back.

—Montembeault made Team Canada for the 4 Nations Faceoff, which might be more telling of the Canadians’ current goaltending talent pool than anything else. Montembeault, 28, has been doing OK in recent years, he’s been Montreal’s No. 1 or 1A goalie since Carey Price had to hang ‘em up in 2022. Stats don’t jump off the page but playing behind a rebuilding team is never good for a goalie’s stats or show his ability. Montembeault is probably third on the pecking order for Canada but it’ll be interesting to see if he gets a chance to show his stuff on a big stage.

Player stats

(via hockeydb)

—It’s ironic the two best players on the Canadiens (aside from Nick Suzuki, anyways) are skilled Americans in Cole Caufield and Lane Hutson. Both of the latter slipped in their respective drafts due to size concerns but have rewarded the faith Montreal showed in them by developing into quality NHL talent in short order.

—It’s encouraging to see Laine back to health and in an NHL lineup. So far, so good with three goals and four points in as many games. Short of Ovechkin and Stamkos, not many can fire the puck from the left side of the ice like Laine can on the power play. When Laine is dialed in he can be a force and he’s started off that way.

—The stats in Montreal’s last seven games shows this is a team with four players that can do a ton of damage. The aforementioned Suzuki, Caufield, Hutson and Laine who have teamed up to produce 30 points over this span. After them, the roster is filled with a bunch of guys, the 16 other skaters who have dressed in this stretch have combined for just 19 points in 98 combined man-games.

—Can you believe Brendan Gallagher is only 32 years old? He’s in his 13th NHL season and if he were like 36 or 37 now that would add up because it feels like he’s been around forever. Josh Anderson at 30 gives the same vibes to a lesser degree. Both of those players still have two years on their contract after this one.

Life in the fast Lane

Lane Hutson is in some good company as far as putting up assists for a rookie defenseman.

Hutson broke a record held by some guy named Chelios for longest point streak by an MTL defenseman when he grabbed an assist on Monday and boosted his current streak to seven games.

And now for the Pens

Projected lines

FORWARDS

Rickard Rakell - Sidney Crosby - Bryan Rust

Philip Tomasino - Evgeni Malkin - Cody Glass

Michael Bunting - Blaze Lizotte - Drew O’Connor

Kevin Hayes - Noel Acciari - Anthony Beauvillier

DEFENSEMEN

Owen Pickering / Kris Letang

Marcus Pettersson / Erik Karlsson

Ryan Graves / Matt Grzelcyk

Goalies: Tristan Jarry and Alex Nedeljkovic

Potential Scratches: Ryan Shea, Matt Nieto, Jesse Puljujarvi

IR: none

—The Pens had a full compliment of the players above at practice yesterday before heading off to Montreal. Not many changes from how they’ve been lately, aside from gradually the former Nashville boys Tomasino and Glass have been taking spots along side Malkin.

—-Random but stood out since there can’t be too many firsts still for the Penguins with Crosby and Malkin..But this has to be the first time both have had two right-handed wingers simultaneously. Strange how that has shaken out lately.

Kris Letang missed three games with an illness in mid-November and since coming back he’s looked revived and fresh.

It’s a homecoming tonight for the Montreal native and per Pens PR: Letang has picked up 37 points (10G-27A) in 46 career games against his hometown team. Here at the Bell Centre, Letang has 17 points (4G-13A) in 24 games.