Well, well, well...look what the cat dragged in: a four-game winning streak!
Your Montreal Canadiens continued to play inspired hockey last night, downing the Toronto Maple Leafs 5-0 yesterday at the ACC.
Shellacked! Not only the Montreal spoil the Mats Sundin jersey retirement night but they spanked the home team in their own barn.
That's gotta hurt.
And the best part? The newest addition, Rene Bourque, continues to get on the scoreboard on a semi-regular basis, notching his third in a Habs uniform. He also finished the night a plus-two.
But who has had a bigger turn around than Max Pacioretty, who, one game after getting a hat-trick, potted his team-leading 23rd of the season last night.
Patches also leads the team in points with 42 in 53 games.
Carey Price's shutout was nice but the revelation of all revelations has to be the strong play of Lars Eller.
Eller is a changed player under since Jacques Martin was pushed aside in favour of Randy Cunneyworth, and his confidence is sky high right now.
Last night, he scored the prettiest goal of the night, turning Leafs defensive stalwart, Dion Phaneuf into a pilon in the process and completely undressing Toronto's netminder.
Here's the vid if you haven't seen it:
That's sweet as molasses!
The streaking Habs now sit seven points out of the eighth and final playoff spot in the East. Still, for Montreal to tie the Leafs for the eighth spot, they would have to win three and a half games while the Leafs lose three and a half games.
To put that in perspective, the Habs have to be perfect over their next four games while the Leafs only have to win one game to remain ahead of Montreal. And that's not even taking into account other teams ahead of Montreal who would also have to lose all of their games.
A steep climb indeed.
I still don't see the Habs making the playoffs but all they can do is keep winning and keep the pressure on the opposition. That's all they can do and, right now, they're doing it pretty well.
--- Kamal is a freelance writer, Senior Writer/Editor-in-Chief of HabsAddict.com, Montreal Canadiens Blogger on Hockeybuzz.com and featured columnist on PowerScoutHockey.com. Kamal is also a weekly contributor to the Sunday Shinny segment of The Franchise weekend morning show, on TSN Radio 990 (AM 990) every Sunday from 9 - 10 AM. Listen live at http://www.tsn.ca/montreal/
Montreal Canadiens Blogger • 
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