Canadiens goaltender Carey Price was back on the ice Wednesday morning in Brossard before the Canadiens’ optional practice. Price, who is recovering from a knee injury suffered in Game 1 of this series, did some lateral movements across the ice and also manned the net with goaltending coach Stéphane Waite shooting pucks his way.
source : faceoff.com
The Canadiens’ playoff hopes will be on the line
again Thursday night when they face the New York Rangers in another
elimination game.
Whatever the outcome in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference final, it’s hard to imagine a carbon copy of Tuesday’s game that featured a total of 11 goals.
The Habs staved off elimination with their 7-4 win.
Canadiens coach Michel Therrien said he liked a lot of things from the game — how his team was involved offensively and how the players handled themselves on the power play.
“The defensive aspects are always something that you can work on and improve very quickly,”
Therrien said before the Canadiens left for New York on Wednesday.
The Canadiens built what briefly looked like a comfortable 4-1 lead on Tuesday, blew it when the Rangers scored three times in under five minutes, then surged ahead when Rene Bourque scored two more goals and earned a hat trick.
The Rangers lead the best-of-seven series 3-2 and head into Thursday’s game with the chance to eliminate the Canadiens on home ice at Madison Square Garden (8 p.m. CBC, RDS, TSN Radio 690).
The Canadiens have to make sure they’re sharp in front of their net and not “giving those Grade-A chances,” defenceman Josh Gorges said.
“But I don’t think we want to change too much, just be a little sharper in a few areas.
“We’ll be ready for one of those tight-checking games, which I’m sure it will be again — one of those hard-fought games that we’re going to have to make sure that we’re even better than we were last game,” Gorges added.
The Canadiens need to be better defensively, David Desharnais acknowledged.
“But I like our compete level, and that’s what’s important,” he said.
Two of the games in the series have ended in overtime. A third game saw nine goals scored and another had 11.
“We’ve seen a lot of different hockey, a lot of different kind of games throughout this series,” Canadiens forward Lars Eller said.
“So you’ve got to expect everything and be ready for anything. Nothing should catch you by surprise by now.”
“But for us, we want to see a lot of the same things that we did yesterday going into the next game. (Tuesday night) was probably the best game we’ve played in this series. So if we keep doing a lot of those things then I think the end result will be good.
“I think it’s been completely unpredictable,” Eller said of the series.
“Game 1 was just a game you want to forget and just a game where everything that could go wrong went wrong.
“Then we played really good Game 2, lose. Didn’t play very good Game 3, won. Game 4, up in the air, could have gone either side. And Game 5 we played the best hockey in this series. Some games have been not very many goals. And some games 10 goals have been scored. It’s been a weird series.”
Bourque led the Habs’ offence in Game 5 and sealed their victory with his hat trick.
“Even at the end of the regular season, we saw Rene engaged in the game a lot more, moving his feet, being physical, going hard to the net,” Therrien said.
Whatever the outcome in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference final, it’s hard to imagine a carbon copy of Tuesday’s game that featured a total of 11 goals.
The Habs staved off elimination with their 7-4 win.
Canadiens coach Michel Therrien said he liked a lot of things from the game — how his team was involved offensively and how the players handled themselves on the power play.
“The defensive aspects are always something that you can work on and improve very quickly,”
Therrien said before the Canadiens left for New York on Wednesday.
The Canadiens built what briefly looked like a comfortable 4-1 lead on Tuesday, blew it when the Rangers scored three times in under five minutes, then surged ahead when Rene Bourque scored two more goals and earned a hat trick.
The Rangers lead the best-of-seven series 3-2 and head into Thursday’s game with the chance to eliminate the Canadiens on home ice at Madison Square Garden (8 p.m. CBC, RDS, TSN Radio 690).
The Canadiens have to make sure they’re sharp in front of their net and not “giving those Grade-A chances,” defenceman Josh Gorges said.
“But I don’t think we want to change too much, just be a little sharper in a few areas.
“We’ll be ready for one of those tight-checking games, which I’m sure it will be again — one of those hard-fought games that we’re going to have to make sure that we’re even better than we were last game,” Gorges added.
The Canadiens need to be better defensively, David Desharnais acknowledged.
“But I like our compete level, and that’s what’s important,” he said.
Two of the games in the series have ended in overtime. A third game saw nine goals scored and another had 11.
“We’ve seen a lot of different hockey, a lot of different kind of games throughout this series,” Canadiens forward Lars Eller said.
“So you’ve got to expect everything and be ready for anything. Nothing should catch you by surprise by now.”
“But for us, we want to see a lot of the same things that we did yesterday going into the next game. (Tuesday night) was probably the best game we’ve played in this series. So if we keep doing a lot of those things then I think the end result will be good.
“I think it’s been completely unpredictable,” Eller said of the series.
“Game 1 was just a game you want to forget and just a game where everything that could go wrong went wrong.
“Then we played really good Game 2, lose. Didn’t play very good Game 3, won. Game 4, up in the air, could have gone either side. And Game 5 we played the best hockey in this series. Some games have been not very many goals. And some games 10 goals have been scored. It’s been a weird series.”
Bourque led the Habs’ offence in Game 5 and sealed their victory with his hat trick.
“Even at the end of the regular season, we saw Rene engaged in the game a lot more, moving his feet, being physical, going hard to the net,” Therrien said.
“He’s doing a lot of good things. You can’t expect a player to score three goals every night or score every game. But even when he doesn’t score, he’s playing solid hockey. He’s getting involved physically. And definitely last night, for me, that was leadership. It was a huge game for us. He came up big, and that’s good not only for him, but for us. I really appreciate his effort last night.”
Alex Galchenyuk, who missed six weeks with a knee injury and returned to action in Game 2 of this series, also played well on Tuesday, scoring the Canadiens’ first goal.
He’s getting better every game and that’s a great sign, Therrien said.
Tuesday’s game was definitely Galchenyuk’s best, the coach added.
“He was involved in the play. He was making plays in tight. He’s got good skill. He was competing.”
Notes: Canadiens goaltender Carey Price was back on the ice Wednesday morning in Brossard before the Canadiens’ optional practice with goaltending coach Stéphane Waite and Graham Rynbend, the team’s head athletic therapist. Price, who is recovering from a knee injury suffered in Game 1 of this series, did some lateral movements across the ice and also manned the net with Waite shooting pucks his way.
Brandon Prust will be back in the lineup Thursday night after serving a two-game suspension for his hit on Rangers forward Derek Stepan, who suffered a broken jaw on the play. Therrien said defenceman Alexei Emelin, who didn’t play Tuesday due to an undisclosed injury, would travel to New York with the team.
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