Habs Blow Out the Candles on 99th Birthday

An anniversary night with vintage jerseys, veteran players and an Original Six match up at the Bell Centre, was taken over by Montreal. A 6-2 win against a team that Montreal is chasing in the standings is perfect. All around superb play, starting off with the 1st line that saw Kostitsyn mark first. The fourth line were the stars of the game in my mind. Laraque-Lapierre-Begin combined for a total of 6 points and 2 goals by the line (Begin, Lapierre). Lapierre had a Gordie Howe hat-trick, scoring, assisting and then fighting was also awarded 1st star of the night. Other goals for Montreal were scored by Tanguay, Lang and D'Agostini. The 22-year old from Sault Ste. Marie finished the night with a goal and an assist. It's not looking good for our friends in the stands: Latendresse, S.Kostitsyn and O'Byrne. Since their benching, the team has been everything but bad. I don't see any reason why Carbo wouldn't keep the same lineups for next game.
Another thing that I liked about the game, was the fact that every line recorded at least a goal, from first to fourth. And finally, a 60 minute performance!! The Canadiens came out flying, early. The game plan was executed to perfection: score early, and score a lot. This deflated the already tired Rangers. New York went all the way to a shootout last night against Pittsburgh. If this is what they can do without a powerplay or without Kovalev scoring, I'm REALLY looking forward to next game.

Notes: Laraque recorded his first and second points as a Hab, recording 2 assists... Montreal totaled 39 shots and allowed only 20... Brisebois and Dandenault were the only players for the Habs that didn't record a shot on goal. Josh Gorges finished the night with an impressive +4... Markov is second on Montreal to reach the 20-point mark, adding 2 assists tonight.