Words that seemed destined to eventually be written as of the day he was drafted in 2019, just months after he scored his 56th goal to break Auston Matthews’ record with the United States National Development Team Program.
Caufield finished with 72 that year, and he’s been building himself into the player who could finally accomplish what he did in Thursday’s 2-1 win over the Tampa Bay Lightning ever since.
“I’m just happy to watch him play,” Caufield’s father, Paul, told Sportsnet in between the second and third period. “I didn’t need 50.”
For 36 years, it’s waited for a scorer of Caufield’s ability, with Stephane Richer’s 51 in 1990 a fading memory for some Canadiens fans.
An entire generation doesn’t have that memory at all. It’s only been told of Richer having that wicked, heavy wrister and that bomb of a slap shot.
One of Caufield’s childhood heroes, Alex Ovechkin, who has topped 50 nine times and become the most prolific scorer ever, has done it similarly. Almost all of his 928 goals have either blown right by or right through goaltenders.
Oh sure, he’s scored on some precise and well-timed moves, breaking ankles with deft directional changes and dangles before applying the finishing touches. But for the most part, he has just loaded up that stick of his like a double-barreled shotgun and blasted away.
Caufield’s proven to be a different — but no less deadly — kind of assassin, throwing ninja stars, slinging arrows, pulling out his Beretta from 30 feet away, or his trusty dagger from close in.
“I always come back to just what he does in practice,” said teammate Mike Matheson. “The fact that he comes in on NHL goalies in a drill setting where the goalie knows where the shot’s coming from on the ice and when it’s going to come, and he still beats him, it’s just so impressive.
“There’s not a lot of guys that can do that.”
There’s only one more in the league ahead, and no others are even, meaning the Rocket Richard Trophy is still up for grabs.
Colorado Avalanche superstar Nathan MacKinnon is just an inch closer to it after having scored his 52nd of the season in a 3-1 win over the Calgary Flames on Thursday.
It was presumably with the chase to become the first Montreal Canadien to win the Rocket in mind that Caufield said, “It’s not over.”
The quest for 50 thankfully is, but the chase for the league lead is still on.
So is the season, and both Caufield and the Canadiens showed on Thursday that they’re ready for whatever comes beyond the final three games.
Including a likely first-round playoff matchup with the Lightning.
“I felt us pulling closer to the best version of ourselves,” said Canadiens coach Martin St. Louis after watching his team give up very few scoring chances while generating several of their own to play its best game in weeks.
The Canadiens weren’t perfect. They blanked on seven power plays.
But at five-on-five, they were organized, defensively committed, particularly structured, and much feistier than we’ve seen them in any other game this season.
“We knew that tonight was going to be a hard-fought battle,” said Josh Anderson, who led with his feet to throw ferocious hits on the forecheck and with his fists to pummel Declan Carlile in a second-period fight.
“We knew how they’ve been playing over the last couple of years, bringing the physicality and everything like that,” Anderson added. “We can play that brand, too.”
In a game that featured 126 penalty minutes between both teams, the Canadiens didn’t just stand up to bullying; they asserted themselves as bullies.
Still, they toed the line and played the right way, immediately taking charge in the first period.
Nick Suzuki and Juraj Slafkovsky nearly broke the game open then.
But after finding iron in the dying moments of the opening frame, they found Caufield in the seventh minute of the second period for the goal that shook the Bell Centre to its foundation.
The pass from Slafkovsky to Suzuki resulted in his 70th point of the season. The pass from Suzuki to Caufield resulted in his 97th. And Caufield felt it couldn’t have been more fitting to have been given the chance to rip his wrist shot over Andrei Vasilivskiy’s right pad by his most steady linemates.
“They work so hard, and I just try to get open to make it easier on them to find me,” said the Wisconsin native. “The way we’ve been working the last couple of years, it definitely feels good to get this as a reward, but there’s a lot of effort and detail that goes into that that might not get recognized. But those two for sure — I wouldn’t have drawn it up any other way.”
It was fitting that it came with the score still at 0-0.
The goal that made him the first American-born 50 goal scorer for the Canadiens — Richer (two times), Guy Lafleur (six times), Steve Shutt, Bernard Geoffrion, Pierre Larouche and Maurice Richard were all born in Canada — was also his 30th go-ahead goal of the season, pushing him past Pavel Bure and into second place behind Brett Hull (39) on that distinguished list.
It was Caufield’s 24th goal at home, his 40th at even strength, and it would’ve been his league-leading 13th game-winner had Darren Raddysh not tied the game 1-1 with Tampa’s net empty at 18:09 of the third period.
Less than 47 seconds later, Suzuki notched his 70th assist and 98th point setting up Slafkovsky’s 30th goal.
The fans roared for Suzuki as the third star. They hollered for Slafkovsky as second. And they exploded for Caufield when he came out for the final curtain call.
The noise in the lead-up to this moment, which got louder and louder as Caufield went goalless over his last three games, became deafening to the player.
“Not going to lie, was pretty stressed out the last couple of days,” he said. “But that’s what makes this place so special.”
It’s a place filled with fans who’ve been starving for Caufield to fulfill the promise they felt he possessed from the minute he dropped into the Canadiens’ laps at 15th overall in the draft.
Back then, Caufield was just a scorer who was hungry to improve in every other department.
As his former coach at the University of Wisconsin, Tony Granato, recalls, Caufield’s appetite was insatiable.
“That’s what makes great players,” said Granato in an interview with Sportsnet after Caufield scored Goals 48 and 49 of his season one week ago in a 4-1 win over the New York Rangers.
“They refuse to be satisfied, refuse to stay status quo, and always try to get better,” Granato continued. “I never saw Cole get to that point of satisfaction over two years at Wisconsin, and I’m pretty confident that Marty would say the same thing about him in Montreal.”
St. Louis, a Hall of Fame player turned coach, brought Caufield under his wing from the moment he took over the Canadiens’ bench in February of 2022, and he shepherded him through the process to become the complete player who now also has 37 assists and a plus-30 rating through 79 games this season.
Caufield gave St. Louis the lion’s share of the credit for that Thursday.
But St. Louis said, “As a coach, you can bring your players and the team to a certain level, but it’s up to them to get to the other side of it,” and he was right about that.
Caufield has benefitted from the help of everyone around him — from St. Louis and the coaching staff to Adam Nicholas and the Canadiens development staff to Suzuki, Slafkovsky and the rest of his teammates — but he’s most responsible for the success he’s enjoyed. His rise to this point has been steady.
It appeared inevitable he’d reach it because, on top of constantly working on his weaknesses, he’s also improved his greatest strength.
It’s enabled Caufield to score from everywhere, but especially from the most punishing area to go to as a five-foot-eight, 175-pound winger.
Caufield’s 50th came from 24 feet away, right past the hash marks of the faceoff circle, and his teammates celebrated him as he celebrates them every day.
You’d think to score 50 goals, you’d need to be fairly selfish, but Caufield’s notorious for being the most selfless Canadien.
It’s been his calling card since he became a household name.
“This is a really funny story,” recalled Granato. “First game in his sophomore year, we were up 2-0 at Notre Dame, and he hadn’t scored a goal in the game. Normally, as a coach, you’re getting your best goal scorer out there late. That’s the guy that deserves a chance to get one. For whatever reason, I didn’t put them out there, and I’ll never forget this: I was thinking he might be pissed at me here, thinking, ‘Hey, you know I don’t have a goal yet.’ He sat there for two minutes, and nobody scored to end the game while their net was empty, and as soon as the buzzer sounded, he jumped out of his seat to celebrate the goaltender getting a shutout like he had scored both goals and won the game all on his own. He just was celebrating everyone else, even though he didn’t get on the ice.
“Think about that. Big first game of what should be — and what ended up being — his last year in college, with everyone expecting him to score. He turned around to me, and I thought he was going to give me hell, but he was just so excited we won our first game of the season.”
Caufield wouldn’t have been pumped for an empty netter.
He’s never scored one in the NHL, and he certainly wasn’t hoping to have the chance to on his way to 50.
Relief washed over him Thursday. Excitement came from seeing Slafkovsky get to 30 to help the Canadiens beat the Lightning.
“A huge win for us,” Caufield said, “and obviously one that I’ll always remember.”