Canadiens Fall Short Against the Maple Leafs

Thursday night at the Bell Centre did not treat the Montreal Canadiens as well as they had hoped, the team was defeated in a 7–2 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs. 

Kirby Dach drew into the lineup after missing the second half of the 2024-2025 season due to knee surgery, centering Patrik Laine and Ivan Demidov. 

Last night was also the first real glimpse of what the Canadiens top 6 could look like this season with Caufield, Suzuki, and Slafkovsky all being in the lineup.

Toronto was able to strike on their first shot of the night, and the rest was history. Gaining a 3–1 lead in just the first period and controlling the puck for most of the night, Montreal was falling behind. Scott Laughton and Steven Lorentz were both on hat trick watch after each scoring twice for the Leafs. Sam Montembeault had a rough night in goal, giving up 5 goals on 17 shots, as the Canadiens struggled to gather their defensive roles. It is common, during the preseason, for the backup goaltender to come in as relief halfway through the game, but Jacob Fowler drew in for the start of the third period. He was able to stop 6 of the 8 shots that came his way.

The Habs had their number of positive moments, but they came almost exclusively during their power plays. Mike Matheson was able to give fans something to cheer about late in the first with a goal set up by Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield, while Patrik Laine embraced his true self with a goal on the man advantage early in the second. However, aside from those moments, the Habs were having a hard time generating any offensive pressure.

Defensively there were not many notable moments either, however the Canadiens’ defensemen were the talk of the night. With Kaiden Guhle, Noah Dobson, and David Reinbacher all being ruled out due to respective injuries, Montreal was down to 4 defensemen by the end of the game. “We just keep going,” Martin St. Louis noted in his postgame conference “I don’t think it’s serious stuff, so I’m not too worried about it.” It was later revealed that Dobson and Guhle are day-to-day with groin injuries, and Reinbacher to be out four weeks due to a broken metacarpal bone (broken hand).

The Habs are back at it on Saturday in Toronto, where they can hopefully come out on top.

While the loss was disappointing for the Canadiens, it doesn’t define what the regular season will look like. However, it does raise the question; are preseason games truly necessary, and if so, how many should there really be?