Well, that wasn’t much fun.
Prior to the game Friday night, folks at Maison Publique McLean’s were putting on a good face, clearly hoping their Montreal Canadiens had one or two more miracles to pull out their helmets. They cheered the arrival of their team on the TV monitors, sang along lustily to Oh Canada, and were pumped up by the notion the Habs could win at least one more playoff game.
Alas, that was not to be. Very quickly it was clear Game 5 of the Eastern Conference final was going to look a heck of a lot like Game 4, which in turn seemed to be a repeat of Game 3. The Carolina Hurricanes’ forecheck smothered the Canadiens yet again, Montreal had great difficulty getting any high-risk shots and soon enough the game was once again out of reach.
From Game 2 onward, the Canadiens have been no match for the Canes. The Hurricanes are a veteran team with real depth in their lineup and a style of playing that’s ingrained in their DNA. The Habs are a young team with little depth who had no answer to the way Carolina plays.
With the win, Monteal is out of the post-season and Carolina moves on to the Stanley Cup final. The final score was 6-1 Hurricanes.
Canadiens fans, from the left, Tori Smith-Ayotte, Charles-Antoine Provencher and Alex Fernet Brochu watch first period action at Maison Publique McLeans as the Canadiens play the Carolina Hurricanes on Friday, May 29, 2026.
It’s a bummer, but everyone I spoke to after the game remains optimistic this Montreal team will do great things in the years to come, and there’s lots of reason to share that positivity. The team has a core of young players unlike any they’ve had in the past 30 years — any team that has Nick Suzuki, Cole Caufield, Juraj Slafkovsky, Lane Hutson and Ivan Demidov is obviously going to be a force to be reckoned with. And the best news of this playoff run is the arrival on the big stage of Jakub Dobes, who looks a heck of a lot like someone who is going to be one of the league’s elite goaltenders.
Mason Harding watches as the Canadiens fall behind 5-0 in the second period.
But what the conference final underlined is Canadiens’ managers Jeff Gorton and Kent Hughes have their work cut out for them in the coming months. We already knew, but now we really know it. This team needs a second-line centre. Now. Jake Evans is an amazing asset. He’s great on the PK, but you can’t have him centring Demidov’s line.
They also need probably two experienced D-men. The lack of a big strong skilled defenceman to clear the front of the net is a glaring issue. Where’s Shea Weber when you need him?
This is going to cause a spitstorm of protest in a town where it is illegal to criticize Saint Marty, but head coach Martin St. Louis didn’t impress in this series. They were probably never going to beat Carolina, but man oh man after being dominated by the Canes in Game 2 and 3, and losing both games, you needed to adjust. But St. Louis did nothing and that led to the disaster that was Game 4.
Canadiens fan Scott Glassman reacts after a goal by the Carolina Hurricanes.
But the real takeaway is this team gave us so much joy this spring. There hasn’t been much to celebrate here for a while. The economy sucks, politics suck, house prices suck, rents suck, potholes suck, even the weather has been sucking. Then along came the youngest team in the National Hockey League and, though no one expected it, not even the team’s managers, they made it to the final four in the best hockey league in the world.
It literally galvanized the city. You couldn’t go anywhere without hearing Habs chatter. There were flags on every second car. People gathered in parks to watch games. There were thousands and thousands of people outside on the street watching on big screens for every home game. It was really kind of beautiful. And you know this story isn’t over yet.
I was out on the town for all 19 games, hanging out in bars, writing columns, shooting videos with my old friend John Kenney, and I really felt there was something going on that was unlike anything I’d ever seen as a longtime Habs watcher. The buzz was off the charts.
Canadiens fans Lara Goldenberg is glum watching the game at Maison Publique McLeans.
“It’s heartbreaking, but now that it’s over you can be happy and celebrate the season,” said Scott Glassman, a Habs fan at Maison Publique McLean’s. “The boys exceeded expectations. That’s beautiful. But it sucks to lose in this way. So mixed emotions. This is the first year of our window. We weren’t even supposed to be here and I think Carolina will have their hands full with us for the next decade. I think this series exposed our youth, our inexperience. Frustration, fatigue got the better of us. Marty talks about growing as a coach. He didn’t adjust to their cycle game. We try to do our transition strike attack, which they were just clogging up. I think there are holes in the roster, the second-line centre. But it’s just inexperience. We weren’t supposed to be here. The next decade we’ll get that maturity.”
Marco Saccaro was also disappointed, but he still feels proud of his team.
“The future is bright,” said Saccaro, who then went off on a tangent about how unbelievable Lane Hutson is.
Saskatoon residents Caitlin Clatney (right, wearing a Canadiens jersey) and her grandmother Val Sheppard react while watching as the Canadiens were being dominated by the Carolina Hurricanes. John Kenney / Montreal Gazette
“I don’t even think of him as a hockey player,” Saccaro said. “He’s wizard. I watch him dance and dangle and do what have you … he’s a special guy.”
Maya Hopkins said it’s not fun to come out on a Friday night and see your team lose.
“But you can’t think about what we lost, you have to think about how far we came,” Hopkins said. “It’s been a great season to watch, especially the community, the fan-base.”
Olyvia Zfira , from New York City, watches as the Carolina Hurricanes score their fifth goal as the Canadiens fall behind 5-0 in the second period.
That is in the end what this magical Dobes spring was all about. Community. People came together all across Montreal — in bars, in churches, in parks, on Avenue des Canadiens — to watch their beloved Montreal Canadiens defy the odds and make it to within three games of the Stanley Cup final. I’ll never forget being outside the Bell Centre when Hutson scored in overtime in Game 3 of the Tampa series and the entire crowd was bouncing up and down. People were pouring beers over each other, strangers were hugging and we were quite literally one. What united us was our love for the Canadiens.
So it’s over and the entire Carolina series was like one serious buzz-kill. But this team brought the city together and everyone I spoke to in recent weeks is convinced this exciting young squad will be pulling off similar theatrics in springs to come. So we’re feeling mixed emotions. It’s always bitter to lose, especially when you lose badly, but we all know this isn’t the end of anything. It’s only the beginning.
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