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This was a night when everyone from the Montreal Canadiens' equipment manager to the team's scoring leader earned overwrought ovations from a home crowd in full playoff froth.

And with good reason.

Hockey's most storied franchise held its 100th home opener last night, the official kickoff for most Montreal fans of a season that begins amid lofty expectations.

The official ceremony featured the two oldest living members of the Canadiens' 44 members of the Hockey Hall of Fame, Elmer Lach and Émile (Butch) Bouchard.

The proceedings took place in a feverish Bell Centre, where the Canadiens were fittingly pitted against perhaps their most bitter historic foe, the Boston Bruins.

Bouchard and a teary Lach, a former Hart Trophy winner and the first recipient of the Art Ross Trophy, awarded to the NHL's top marksman beginning in 1948, did the honours for the ceremonial faceoff.

And on the night hardcase winger Georges Laraque made his Canadiens' debut, it was only apt the other official at the pregame ceremony was 89-year-old Bouchard, a fearsomely tough defenceman during a 15-year career in the 1940s and 1950s.

Laraque's first shift as a Hab was an eventful one: He dropped the gloves with Bruins tough guy Shawn Thornton within seconds of hopping over the boards.

Before the game began, the Canadiens unveiled a Ring of Honour that hails the accomplishments of the team's Hall of Famers.

The ceremony featured former players standing in the Bell Centre's rafters beside their own black-and-white likenesses.

Iconic former captains such as Jean Béliveau and current general manager Bob Gainey, the price tag still hanging from the sleeve of his red Canadiens jersey, were among those waving to the capacity crowd.

Before the ceremonies and the game, throngs of fans gathered outside the Bell Centre to revel in the opening festivities — the atmosphere evoked the postseason more than it did the regular season.

"On paper, this is easily the best team we've had since 1994, we know they're going to play their hardest this year," said Jonathan Bailey, who made the trip from Alfred, Ont.

Bailey and his friend, Eric Delorme, were bedecked in vintage Canadiens' jerseys, Canadiens' long underwear and sheepskin hats covered in Canadiens decals, which they had also applied to their faces.

"I don't know if it smells like the Cup this year, but it sure smells like the Cup finals. But I guess we'll see," Delorme said.

"One thing's for sure, there's a lot of excitement, a lot of people who had kind of abandoned the team are back, like my parents," he continued.

The Canadiens' inaugural home game, a star-studded affair even during less auspicious times, was a veritable Who's Who of the Habs' past and present.

Before the game, Hall of Famers Guy Lapointe, Larry Robinson and Dick Duff hobnobbed with fellow inductees — and onetime linemates — Guy Lafleur, Steve Shutt and Yvan Cournoyer in the bowels of the Bell Centre.

The soirée kicked off with a photo collage on the arena's spanking new digital scoreboard.

It was followed by an inventive video that melded colour images of today's Canadiens on grainy black-and-white game films from the 1950s.

It all began with Habs captain Saku Koivu, strongly criticized in the city's French-speaking press last year for omitting to say a few words in Quebec's majority language for the team's pregame videos, speaking French.

And the global credit crisis be damned, the ultimate bellwethers of a healthy capitalist economy — the scalpers who lurk outside the Bell Centre — were doing just fine.

Single game tickets for the 100th home opener were reportedly selling for $300.