Tonight is no different as the struggling Tampa Bay Lightning will be visiting the Bell Centre for the fourth and final regular season match between these two clubs.
Tampa took the first two games with Montreal taking the third in Tampa just over ten days ago.
Only four points separate these two teams in the standings.
Standings
Both teams have played 70 games and Montreal is sixth overall in the East with 83 points to the Lightning's fifth overall 87 points, also in 70 games.
A win by the Lightning would give them a nice six-point buffer over Montreal while bringing them to within one point of the fourth overall Penguins. For Montreal, this game is an opportunity to close the gap on the Lightning and the Bruins—Boston also has 87 points.
Goaltending
There is no word yet on which goaltender will start for either team but you would have to think that Carey Price will get the call for Montreal. The Habs are playing again tomorrow in New York against the Rangers and coaches often like to play the backup in the second of back-to-back games, as teams tend to play tighter defensively in front of their backups.
Either way, with the Rangers tomorrow and the Wild on Sunday it is possible that Alex Auld could be in the net as soon as tonight.
For Tampa, despite winning their last game 6-2 against the Leafs, they have been in a free fall since the beginning of March—they are 2-4-2 over their last eight games.
As such, it is a bit of a mystery as to who will be getting the call for Tampa however with Dwayne Roloson getting six of the last eight starts he will likely get the nod.
Scoring and Special Teams
Tonight's contest is a pretty clear-cut matchup of offense versus defense. However given the Habs depleted lineup—Tomas Plekanec and Jeff Halpern joined the team clinic last game—Montreal will be missing some key parts of their defense-first game.
Tampa is a scoring machine averaging a sixth overall 2.9 goals per game and the sixth best power play in the league at 20.7 percent efficiency. On the defensive side of the puck Tampa has the 24th overall goals-against at 2.9 per game and a respectable 11th overall penalty kill at 83.3 percent efficiency.
Montreal's numbers are pretty much reversed with the 23rd overall goals-for at 2.6 per game, the seventh best PP at 19.7 percent, the eighth best goals-against at 2.5 per game and the seventh best PK at 83.9 percent efficiency.
The problem for Montreal is that Plekanec and Halpern are two of their best penalty killers. In addition, Plekanec has been playing the point on the first wave of the PP so his absence from the lineup is a massive loss for the Habs.
Roster Changes and Injuries
The Habs, who seem to lose another player to injury every game, will be playing without Brent Sopel (Day to day), Jaroslav Spacek (Injured reserve), Mathieu Darche (Injured reserve), Andrei Markov (Injured reserve), Josh Gorges (Injured reserve), Max Pacioretty (Injured reserve), Tomas Plekanec (Day to day) and Jeff Halpern (Day to day).
That makes eight regular players that are out of the lineup for Montreal.
Yowza!
Tampa too has their share of problems with Pavel Kubina serving a suspension and Randy Jones (Day to day), Ryan Malone (Injured reserve) and Steve Downie (Day to day) out with injuries.
The major roster changes will be in the Habs camp where Plekanec and Halpern are out and Nigel Dawes and Aaron Palushaj—they were recalled from the AHL Hamilton Bulldogs yesterday—will be making their season debuts for Montreal.
Key Matchup
It's pretty simple here: offense versus defense. Although with two of the Habs best defensive players out of the lineup all eyes will be on Dawes and Palushaj to see how they perform.
With no word yet on how Jacques Martin intends to compose his lines tonight, Palushaj in particular will be a player to watch as he could end up seeing time in the top-six.
Game time is at 7:30 PM.
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Kamal is a freelance Habs writer, Senior Writer/Editor-in-Chief of HabsAddict.com, Montreal Canadiens Blogger on Hockeybuzz.com and Habs writer on TheFranchise.ca. Kamal is also a weekly contributor to the Sunday Shinny on The Team 990 (AM 990) every Sunday from 8 - 9 AM. Listen live at http://www.team990.com/
(Photo by Richard Wolowicz/Getty Images North America)
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