The Montreal Canadiens have used their youth and energy to keep up with the Tampa Bay Lightning through the first four games of this series, but one of the focuses now is avoiding letting the experience of the Lightning take over in a familiar spot.
This series between the Canadiens and Lightning has been the tightest of any in the first round of the NHL playoffs. The two teams are tied two games apiece through four, where the only two-goal lead of the series came when the Canadiens took a 2-0 lead in Game 4.
That game was ultimately won 3-2 by the Lightning, who were bolstered by two third-period goals from Brandon Hagel.
“We’ll turn the page and try to focus on the next game and controlling our emotions,” Canadiens forward Alexandre Texier said after the game on Sunday. “We have veterans on the bench who can help calm things down if any of the younger guys get carried away by the crowd or the refereeing.
“Whatever the case, we are going to stick to our system, our style of play that works, and not get distracted by our emotions. We’re managing it well so far. It’s sports so that’s going to happen, but we have to limit that and keep up our pace and stick to our game.”
One of the biggest storylines entering this series was the disparity in playoff experience between the clubs. The Lightning, who are playing in their ninth consecutive Stanley Cup Playoffs and took home back-to-back titles in 2020 and 2021, had a combined 1,437 games of playoff experience on their roster entering this series. Canadiens players entered the series with just 435 combined games of playoff experience.
The Lightning defeated the Canadiens 4-1 in the Stanley Cup Final in 2021. Montreal has six holdovers from that team, including current stars Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield, who were rookies then. The Lightning have eight, including that year’s Conn Smythe winner Andrei Vasilevskiy in net, as well as Ted Lindsay Award finalist Nikita Kucherov and other veterans.
“I don’t think there’s really one thing that works more than it did in the regular season,” Alex Newhook, who won the 2022 Stanley Cup with the Colorado Avalanche, said on Sunday. “With the details and all the attention to checking and defending, I think it just makes everything a little bit harder in the playoffs to execute and to generate, so I don’t think there’s really one thing that’s different in the regular season. It just elevates your need to execute at a high level.”
Habs captain Nick Suzuki, who led the team with 101 points in the regular season but has not scored a goal through the first four games, said that managing the team’s emotions may be the biggest challenge moving forward in the series.
“Biggest challenge [would] probably be managing emotions,” Suzuki said to reporters after practice on Tuesday. “We could be down or we could be up 3-1, it’s been tight every game, little things can turn good and bad so I think managing [emotions], staying patient, staying calm in high-intensity situations.”
Suzuki isn’t the only forward who has gotten off to a slow start in this series for Montreal. The Canadiens do not have an even-strength goal from any of their top six forwards.
“It’s something we’re looking at,” said head coach Martin St. Louis on Monday. “We’re trying to find the formula. It’s not one player, it’s the group. We’re looking at it systematically. There are moments where they were able to find open space, but there weren’t enough of those moments. We’re going to continue to see what we can do.”
Texier says the top line is playing good hockey, despite the lean five-on-five numbers.
“It’s going to click at some point,” he said Monday. “I’m not worried.”
Game 5 of the series goes Wednesday in Tampa, where production from the top Habs lines can help take a commanding 3-2 series lead.
