Josh Anderson and Cole Caufield had three points apiece in the Montreal Canadiens’ 5-2 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs on Monday night.
Anderson, twice, Caufield, Mike Hoffman and Rem Pitlick blackened the score sheet for the Canadian (11-33-7), who at the same time signed a third victory in a row.
Nick Suzuki also amassed an assist, which allowed him to become the first Habs player to reach 30 points this season.
Ilya Mikheyev and Pierre Engvall scored for the Maple Leafs (32-14-3), who have suffered four losses in their last six games.
Since it was the second game in as many nights for the Canadiens, interim head coach Martin St-Louis sent goaltender Samuel Montembeault into the fray. The Quebecer was brilliant with 35 saves en route to a second straight win.
His vis-à-vis, Petr Mrazek, seemed “rusty” at times – he was only playing his 10th game this season – and he finished the game having stopped 20 shots in front of the Leafs net.
The Canadiens will now host the Buffalo Sabers at the Bell Center on Wednesday night. Jeff Skinner had four goals in the last game between the two teams, which ended 5-3 in favor of the Sabers on February 13.
The return of the fans to the stands at the Bell Center seemed to galvanize the Canadiens early in the game.
After Pitlick’s failed breakaway early in the game, Anderson opened the scoring with less than three minutes remaining in the first half. Jeff Petry and Caufield were his accomplices.
Caufield and Anderson came back with 50 seconds to go, and this time it was the Habs’ No. 22 who found the back of Mrazek’s net. It was suddenly 2-0 in favor of the Canadian, after 20 minutes of play.
The Montreal steamroller — yes, yes! — continued his good work after the intermission by adding three more goals to the table.
Mrazek first looked bad on a tight wrist shot from Hoffman, just 38 seconds into the second period.
The Leafs goaltender thought he had stopped the bleeding by stealing a certain goal from Anderson halfway through the period, but the Canadian forward recovered nicely. Anderson netted the fourth for CH on a nice pass from Caufield, with 4:02 left in the period.
Pitlick added before the end of the second period, to make it 5-0.
Mikheyev and Engvall fought back in the final third, but the Leafs ran out of time to complete the comeback. St-Louis has at the same time reconnected with the threshold of respectability since taking office, by virtue of its 3-3 record.
St. Louis had kept the same lineup as in the last game, Sunday, against the New York Islanders. Only goalkeeper Andrew Hammond gave way to Montembeault against the Maple Leafs, who had defeated the Bleu-blanc-rouge 2-1 at the regular season curtain raiser on October 13.