Cole Caufield must score goals if Canadiens hope to advance past Lightning
Two games don’t make a series, and there’s plenty of hockey left to be played between the Canadiens and Tampa Bay Lightning.
But Cole Caufield, who scored 51 goals during the regular season, has yet to beat Lightning goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy. And while Caufield has three assists through two games, he must produce offence for the Canadiens to advance.
Montreal’s top line, consisting of Caufield, Nick Suzuki and , has been outscored 3-0 during even-strength situations. And while Slafkovsky’s of this best-of-seven series paced the Canadiens’ victory, all three — including the overtime winner — were scored on the power play.
Suzuki, the Canadiens’ captain who produced a career-high 101 points this season, also has three assists.
Montreal has scored a modest six goals in the series — all but one coming from Slafkovsky and Josh Anderson.
“I think we expect more from ourselves,” Caufield said following Thursday’s practice in Brossard. “That’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to build off the energy of playing here. It’s a fun time of the year to play, obviously. It’s back to zero-zero and keeping that same mentality going forward.”
The Canadiens seized home-ice advantage with Sunday’s win, and now it’s imperative for Montreal to continue holding serve, beginning with Friday night’s third game at the Bell Centre (7 p.m., CBC, SN, TVA Sports, TSN Radio 690, 98.5 FM). Game 4 of the series goes Sunday night.
Open ice has come at a premium for Caufield, only 5-foot-8 and 175 pounds. and it becomes more difficult to find those areas during the playoffs — especially against the Lightning, the NHL’s most penalized team this season.
“There’s ways around it,” he explained. “Playing a little bit more with the puck. And when we don’t have it, trying to get it back. I think it’s pretty straightforward what we’ve got to do. Obviously there’s not much room out there but, when there is, we’ve got to take advantage of that.”
For all of Caufield’s regular-season success, he has generally been more offensively challenged come playoff time. In 27 career games, he has seven goals and 12 assists, although he did score three of the Canadiens’ 12 goals during last year’s five-game series against Washington.
“It’s not always going to be pretty every night,” Caufield said. “Just finding ways to get the job done is what’s most important right now. The hit numbers are up in every series. That’s what makes it so difficult … and why it’s so special to win. We’re just going to try to keep working through it.
“There’s obviously more that we (as a line) want to generate. Hopefully we can do that in this upcoming game. (We’ve got to) get on the board.”
Offensively talented players such as Caufield generally score in bunches when they’re most effective. But they also can endure lapses during which they fail to score.
Caufield went three games without scoring while seeking his , which finally came April 9, against Tampa Bay. He also scored in Montreal’s next game, against Columbus.
“I think we can be better pretty much everywhere and keep finding little ways to break them down,” Caufield admitted. “I don’t think there’s such a thing as (opening up the) floodgates. There’s just the next one. No matter who (scores it) it’s special. At this time of year just finding the first one … the next one … is most important.”
It’s well known Canadiens head coach Martin St. Louis, himself 5-foot-8 and 180 pounds, flourished offensively throughout his career. And in 107 playoff games, he scored 42 goals while producing 90 points.
While he had little to say about Caufield’s offensive funk, it’s clear he’s not concerned.
“Just trust his game,” St. Louis said laconically.
The coach was more expressive when describing his team’s inability to protect a one-goal third-period lead on Tuesday before losing 3-2 in overtime. The Canadiens appeared to play too defensively too prematurely and were outshot 17-6 — including 9-0 in overtime — over the final 32:48.
“I feel like we lost our way,” St. Louis said. “We weren’t giving them much until about 10 minutes were left in the third. We controlled a lot of that game.”
Defenceman Mike Matheson and Anderson (therapy days) were both excused from Thursday’s practice. And if Kirby Dach, whose costly icing in overtime — leading to the winning goal off the ensuing faceoff — is about to be benched, St. Louis predictably failed to show his hand.
“We’re not perfect. Guys are going to make mistakes,” he said. “I can tell you we had good intentions out there. Stick together.”
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