{"id":644639,"date":"2026-05-02T09:37:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-02T09:37:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/644639\/"},"modified":"2026-05-02T09:37:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-02T09:37:10","slug":"canadiens-believe-best-is-yet-to-come-in-game-7-vs-lightning-meant-to-be","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/644639\/","title":{"rendered":"Canadiens believe best is yet to come in Game 7 vs. Lightning: ‘Meant to be’"},"content":{"rendered":"

MONTREAL \u2014 One inch, one chance, one wild swipe at a puck from a player who\u2019d barely had it on his stick through the first 21 periods of this series proved to be the difference in the closest game of this punch-for-punch battle between the Tampa Bay Lightning<\/a> and Montreal Canadiens<\/a>.<\/p>\n

They went 0-0 to overtime in Game 6 Friday. Wild scoring chances were erased by desperate saves through the first nine minutes of the 22nd\u00a0period of this series before Gage Goncalves got his stick\u00a0free of Kaiden Guhle\u2019s to save the Lightning\u2019s season.<\/p>\n

He poked and prodded and finally got the puck past Jakub Dobes on Tampa\u2019s 33rd\u00a0shot of the game.<\/p>\n

The Canadiens had 30 of their own.<\/p>\n

Faceoffs went 24-23 in their favour. Hits went 50-37 their way. They blocked 22 shots, while Tampa only blocked 13.<\/p>\n

But this game \u2014 like every other one of this series \u2014 was a coinflip, and it was Tampa\u2019s turn to win.<\/p>\n

It would\u2019ve been one thing had the Canadiens just lost it. Had they clamped up and choked away their first opportunity to eliminate the Lightning.<\/p>\n

But that\u2019s not what happened.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt we were calm through the chaos,\u201d said Canadiens coach Martin St. Louis. \u201cWe were good. There was no panic. We had everybody going tonight. It\u2019s unfortunate you don\u2019t get the result, but what a hockey game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both teams have three wins, each with two in overtime, one at home and two on the road. Goals are 14-14. There\u2019s only been one two-goal lead the whole time, and it lasted all of 5:37.<\/p>\n

Consecutive losses just weren\u2019t in the cards for the Lightning.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been unreal, to be honest,\u201d said their best player, Brandon Hagel. \u201cWe both had 106 points coming into this series. They\u2019re a really, really good hockey team over there, we\u2019re a really, really good team here. I don\u2019t think we expected anything else, other than what\u2019s been going on. They have incredible players, they\u2019ve got everything over there, and we think we\u2019ve got everything over here, so there\u2019s no doubt in mind that\u2019s why this series is kind of going the way we expected it to. There\u2019s going to be a lot of ups and downs. That\u2019s just the reality of hockey and the reality of the playoffs, so you\u2019ve gotta be able to control your emotions and control when adversity hits, and I think our team\u2019s been doing a really good job of it. And give them credit, too, their team\u2019s been doing a really good job of it as well. So, it\u2019s going to come down to one game.\u201d<\/p>\n

St. Louis called it destiny for his young group.<\/p>\n

\u201cThings are meant to be, and I think it\u2019s meant to be for our growth to go play a Game 7,\u201d he said. \u201cI think it\u2019s going to help us for what\u2019s next for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

The path to this moment has been an incredible journey, especially considering it started at rock bottom five years ago.<\/p>\n

The Canadiens then dove head-first into the first-ever rebuild in their 100-plus year history \u2014 just months after their last Stanley Cup run, which ended at Benchmark International Arena (then known as Amalie Arena) at the hands of many core players still propelling this Lightning team.<\/p>\n

Nick Suzuki, Cole Caufield, Brendan Gallagher<\/a>, Josh Anderson and Jake Evans<\/a>, who were on the ice for the Canadiens that night in 2021, have been in Montreal ever since, just waiting for a chance like this.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an opportunity to slam the Lightning\u2019s window shut and hand them their fourth consecutive first-round exit.<\/p>\n

After the Canadiens won Game 5 of this series, Gallagher talked about how the painful memories of losing Game 5 in 2021 haunt him every time he steps foot in the home of the Lightning.<\/p>\n

After losing Game 6 in Montreal, Evans said, \u201cI try to block it out and not relive those days.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of the opportunity directly in front of him and the Canadiens, he said, \u201cI think the way I look at it is they\u2019ve been a top team for a long time, and a Stanley Cup contender for a long time. We\u2019re up and coming, but I feel like we\u2019re just as good and can win this series.\u201d<\/p>\n

It looked like it might happen Friday.<\/p>\n

Chances for Juraj Slafkovsky and Lane Hutson<\/a> in overtime were two of many the Canadiens generated that could\u2019ve won them the game.<\/p>\n

Ivan Demidov and Cole Caufield had incredible ones before that, but Andrei Vasilevskiy matched Dobes save for save and came up with his best stuff before Goncalves scored.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe learned we had the best goalie in the world,\u201d said Hagel. \u201cI think we already knew that, but he was incredible.\u201d<\/p>\n

Who wasn\u2019t in this game?<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was such a great game,\u201d said St. Louis. \u201cI think both teams played their best game of the series.\u201d<\/p>\n

The team that had to win it most did, and so we play on.<\/p>\n

\u201cTwo of the best teams in the East going at it,\u201d said Hutson, \u201cso it\u2019ll be fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019ll be tense, fierce, exciting, and hopefully just as close as it\u2019s been in every game so far.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s so even. From the special teams to goaltending to everything,” said Lightning coach Jon Cooper. \u201cThat\u2019s how you get Game 7s. To win this, you\u2019re going to have a special game from your team.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Canadiens played a great one Friday and lost by one inch, one chance, one wild swipe at a puck from a player who hadn\u2019t touched it much through this series.<\/p>\n

But they believe their best is coming Sunday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a great opportunity, and you just have to look at it that way,\u201d said Evans. \u201cIf we play the way we\u2019re supposed to, I like our chances.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MONTREAL \u2014 One inch, one chance, one wild swipe at a puck from a player who\u2019d barely had…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":644640,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-644639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=644639"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644639\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/644640"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=644639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=644639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=644639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}