79
MONTREAL — Not only did the spell that the Montreal Canadiens held over the Boston Bruins in the regular season continue in the playoff opener last night, Canadiens coach Guy Carbonneau's lucky necktie continued to work its magic.
"It's 2-0," Carbonneau said of the birthday present from his wife after his team's 4-1 victory at the Bell Centre. "You'll probably see it again."
The first time Carbonneau wore it was when the Canadiens clinched a playoff berth last month. But there was nothing lucky about Montreal's dominant win in the curtain raiser.
The Canadiens had their usual speedy game with swift puck movement, but also outhit their nervous opponents and as a result won most of the battles for the puck.
Bryan Smolinski, bottom, celebrates his goal with teammate Steve Begin past Boston Bruins goaltender Tim Thomas as Bruins' Phil Kessel and defenceman Aaron Ward. (Paul Chiasson/CP)
Related Articles
Internet Links
Related Information
- Boston Bruins
- Montreal Canadiens
- Shane Hnidy
- Saku Koivu
- Mike Komisarek
- Andrei Kostitsyn
- Sergei Kostitsyn
- Tom Kostopoulos
- Maxim Lapierre
- Guillaume Latendresse
- Tomas Plekanec
- Carey Price
- Marc Savard
- Bryan Smolinski
- Tim Thomas
They also received strong games from the third and fourth lines, which led to goals from Bryan Smolinski and Tom Kostopoulos in the second and third periods, respectively, to put the game out of reach for Boston.
"I think the players decided that they didn't want to get outhit," said Carbonneau, whose players delivered a dozen more hits at 37-25. "That wasn't something I talked to them about."
The Canadiens reeled off eight wins in as many games against the Bruins in the regular season, but the winning streak hit 12 games, dating to the final three regular-season meetings in 2006-07.
"We have played well against them all season," Carbonneau said. "The guys came in nervous, but full of confidence."
The Bruins were also the more jittery team, however, and played a sloppy and panicky game early. Montreal's Sergei Kostitsyn required only 34 seconds to put his team on the scoreboard and his older brother Andrei followed suit with a dandy goal 88 seconds later. It was the first time a brother act scored in a playoff game for Montreal since Frank and Peter Mahovlich turned the trick on April 14, 1974, at Madison Square Garden.
"We looked nervous at the beginning," said Bruins coach Claude Julien, whose team's goal from Shane Hnidy came on a deflection midway through the first period. "When you're nervous you make mistakes."
The Canadiens received a huge lift from their earsplitting crowd, which made it difficult for the players to hear each other and Carbonneau in the first period. Instead, the Montreal players sent signals to each other by their hard work and willingness to take the body to the Bruins. Boston's behemoth captain, Zdeno Chara, took the brunt of several hits, including a borderline check from behind, from Andrei Kostitsyn, in the first period.
"[Chara is] definitely their best player," Kostopoulos said. "They were going to hit our best players and we wanted to bump and grind on him and try to wear him down."
The physical play from Canadiens such as Andrei Kostitsyn and Alex Kovalev filtered down the lineup. "When you see your star players on your team getting physical, it sets the tone," Kostopoulos said.
"The knock on us has been that we're a soft team," Canadiens forward Christopher Higgins added. "But I just don't see that. We have proven and proved again in this game that we can hit."
While the Bruins had eight players making their Stanley Cup playoff debuts, including leading scorer Marc Savard, who returned after missing the final seven games of the regular season with a broken bone in his back, Montreal had seven first-time NHL playoff participants. Three of them, Kostopoulos and the Kostitsyns, scored. And rookie goaltender Carey Price notched his first NHL postseason win with a 17-save performance.
"The guys that didn't have any experience didn't show it," Carbonneau said. "But we have been playing like this since September. We have played this way for the past eight months."
About the only area that the Canadiens failed to live up to was with the man advantage. Montreal had the league's top power-play unit in the regular season, but in the series opener the Canadiens were 0-for-6 and completely messed up a two-minute 5-on-3 advantage late in the game.
By the Numbers
2 - Goals scored by Sergei and Andrei Kostitsyn in the opening 2 minutes 2 seconds to become the first brother act to score goals in a Canadiens playoff game in 34 years.
74 - Number of times in 104 first-round series since 1993-94 that have been won by the team that wins the series opener.
1 - Stanley Cup playoff games for Canadiens rookie goalie Carey Price and Boston centre Marc Savard. Price, however, has played in only 41 NHL regular-season games, compared with Savard's 659.
