The Montréal Canadiens led the NHL with 9 short-handed goals in the regular season. Paul Byron had the game winner with a short-handed goal in Game 1 against Toronto. Tyler Toffoli had the only goal in Game 2 against Winnipeg, also short-handed. Joel Armia added 2 short-handed goals in Game 3, including the game winner.
Toffoli scored the overtime winner in Game 4 to send the Habs to the Stanley Cup semifinals. The primary assist came from Cole Caufield. Caufield hasn't scored a playoff goal, yet has 2 overtime assists.
Carey Price was outstanding in goal for the Canadiens but didn't have to work too hard.
The Winnipeg Jets had the momentum after sweeping the Edmonton Oilers in 4 straight. The Jets ended the playoffs with a 4-4 record.
Winnipeg got a short-handed goal in Game 1 from Adam Lowry. The Canadiens scored 3 goals during the Jets power play vs. 0 for Winnipeg.
Mark Scheifele has had a rough couple of playoff years for the Jets. Scheifele didn't last long in 2020 after Calgary's Matthew Tkachuk did injure Scheifele, knocking him out of the series with an Achilles injury. Scheifele's brutal hit on Jake Evans in 2021 brought him a 4-game suspension.
Having Scheifele might have made the series closer, though the Jets looked lost after Game 1. Winnipeg scored 3 goals in the final 3 games, 2 of them from rookie defenseman Logan Stanley in Game 4.
Paul Stastny missed time in the series. Pierre-Luc Dubois was there but had an underwhelming playoffs. A team that has serious centre depth watched that disappear.
Winnipeg's best play of the series might have been Nikolaj Ehlers doing what he could to protect Evans.
The scene from the ice is fantastic! #StanleyCup pic.twitter.com/TZ7xVsDuTH
— NHL (@NHL) June 8, 2021
Montréal has been a road king in the playoffs. 3-1 in Toronto and 2-0 in Winnipeg. Contrast that with 1-2 at home against Toronto and 2-0 at home against Winnipeg.
The team is 3-0 with fans and 0-2 without fans at the Bell Centre.
This year's version is now in second place all-time for longest stretch without trailing in the Stanley Cup playoffs. The Habs haven't trailed since Game 4 of Toronto series.
Montréal Canadiens 1960 488:38
Montréal Canadiens 2021 437:53
Montréal and Winnipeg have now had to deal with a pair of back-to-back games in the NHL playoffs. No U.S. team has had to deal with a single back-to-back in the playoffs. In the first round, the Canadiens went 0-2 in the back-to-backs while the Jets went 2-0 with 4 overtime periods in the team's back-to-back. The Habs took both games of this round's back-to-back games.
The Canadiens are now 3-0 in overtime games while the Jets fell to 3-1 in overtime games.
More @CBCNews: Federal government approves travel exemption for Stanley Cup playoffs. https://t.co/8lAMgo9WhV
— CBC News Alerts (@CBCAlerts) June 6, 2021
What sports will look like on Canadian soil in 2020
Montréal will be able to travel to the U.S. west and back during the Stanley Cup semifinals and travel between the countries for the Stanley Cup final, as needed. The teams will have to observe significant protocols on top of what the NHL has required.
At least the Canadiens will have true home games for the rest of the playoffs. They will have a long distance to travel for that series, especially the shorter distance of the other playoff series.
As our scoreboard has noted, Montréal will play either Colorado or Las Vegas in the Stanley Cup semifinals. That series is currently tied 2-2 with Game 5 tonight.
2021 Stanley Cup notebook: Montreal advances to play Winnipeg
2021 Stanley Cup notebook: Toronto-Montreal reaches Game 7
2021 Stanley Cup notebook: Winnipeg Jets pull off the sweep
Winnipeg has been allowing 500 fully vaccinated healthcare workers in the first 2 games at Bell MTS Place. Toronto had 550 fully vaccinated healthcare workers for Game 7. Montréal is allowing 2,500 fans for each game at the Bell Centre.
The United States crowds are much larger though a small amount of fans can be rather loud.
Canadian films that might explain a bit about the world of residential schools
Even before the end of the NBC NHL contract, the network gave little interest in anthems, even in playoff games. The network doesn't have respect for what the anthem provides in setting the tone.
That ignorance was amplified in Game 1 when Winnipeg singer/songwriter Don Amero gave a powerful rendition of O Canada in the context of the discovery of the bodies of 215 children at a residential school in Kamloops, BC. The woman to his left is holding a small pair of moccasins, symbolic of the shoes left at the scene by grieving people for the loss of those children.
We do criticise Rogers Sportsnet for a lot, but they get the significance of the anthem. The ignoramuses at NBC only care about getting in extra Discover credit card ads. Shame on NBC.
You can watch the Game 1 anthem thanks to Rogers Sportsnet and CBC.
NBC didn't air any anthems in Games 1-3. The NHL Network didn't air the anthem in Game 4 but using the NBC feed, the channel didn't have control.
2021 NHL Stanley Cup playoffs preview for Canadian teams
The Canadian teams remain in their original draft positions: Vancouver (9), Ottawa (10), and Calgary (13). The Seattle Kraken moved up from 3 to 2 with Anaheim dropping a slot. Buffalo retains the top spot in the NHL draft.
NHL notebook: Waiting to start the Stanley Cup chase in Canada
The Montréal-Winnipeg series is drawing good numbers in Canada, just not Montréal-Toronto numbers from the first round. These are the numbers for CBC and Sportsnet:
Game 1: 2,368,000
Game 2: 2,376,000
Game 3: 1,629,000
Game 4: 2,487,000
Those numbers are slightly higher than Game 1 Winnipeg at Edmonton (2,038,000) but lower than the lowest numbers from Montréal-Toronto (Game 2 3,096,000).
Game 3 is a lot lower without the CBC to help out, thanks to the 2021 Junos.
These do not include TVA Sports numbers. Game 2 drew 1,000,000 and Game 3 had 1,161,000 on TVA Sports. By contrast, Game 6 drew 1,185,000 and Game 7 drew 1,150,000 en Francaise in the last Habs series.
We will update this story with Game 4 numbers.
2021 Stanley Cup playoffs scoreboard
June 2 Game 1 Montréal @ Winnipeg 7:30p Alex Faust/Dominic Moore
June 4 Game 2 Montréal @ Winnipeg 7:30p John Forslund/Dominic Moore
June 6 Game 3 Winnipeg @ Montréal 6p Alex Faust/Dominic Moore
June 7 Game 4 Winnipeg @ Montréal 8p Alex Faust/Dominic Moore
We had hoped Game 4 would be a CBC/Sportsnet simulcast on the NHL Network. NBC had no choice but to use the NHL Network, which traditionally means a sim sub. There are exceptions, as we saw in 2020.
The NHL Network handled both intermissions. NBCSN has joined in progress during the 2nd period. There were dueling 2nd period intermissions. Guess which one was better?
John Forslund jumped into the series for Game 2. Forslund kept getting the name of the arena in Winnipeg wrong several times. Forslund's style is to throw robotic things in there like where he is (theoretically). He would run the term "Canada's capital" into the ground for Senators playoff games. Our annoyance ties back to the January 2020 appearance where they (likely) pretended to be in Canada.
Forslund kept saying "MTS Centre" and "MTS Place" instead of Bell MTS Place — close but not correct. He could say "Bell Centre." Someone could have corrected him. The name of the arena is in the ice at centre ice.
CanadianCrossing.com NHL coverage
We have noted that Rogers Sportsnet had been using CBC facilities for its NHL coverage since the new hockey contract started in 2014. Rogers announced a new studio is coming in the fall. We figured the use of the CBC studio was additional compensation for putting its broadcasts on the public broadcaster.
The 6 CBC promos can't be enough.
We did get a Game 7 matinee rebroadcast of the CBC feed on the NHL Network. There was only a 90-minute version so most of the promos didn't air. The NHL Network will run a matinee rebroadcast of Game 4 at 2 pm Eastern today. In that rebroadcast, the CBC Gem was visual only, as far as we know.
Montréal-Toronto Game 7: CBC Sports app (1st); CBC Listen app (3rd)
Montréal-Winnipeg Game 4: CBC Sports app (1st); The National (2nd); CBC Gem (3rd)
photos credit: Rogers Sportsnet/NHL
Twitter captures: @NHL; @CBCAlerts
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