{"id":618479,"date":"2026-04-21T09:10:21","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T09:10:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/618479\/"},"modified":"2026-04-21T09:10:21","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T09:10:21","slug":"carriers-return-sparks-canadiens-win-against-lightning-in-game-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/618479\/","title":{"rendered":"Carrier’s return sparks Canadiens’ win against Lightning in Game 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

When it comes to the rough stuff, Carrier has never backed down, but he tends to find himself more often the target rather than the aggressor. In the Canadiens’ 2025 Eastern Conference First Round series against the Washington Capitals, Carrier was belabored relentlessly, taking 26 hits in just five games. Kaiden Guhle<\/a> (24 hits), Mike Matheson<\/a> (15), and Lane Hutson<\/a>\u00a0(12) also received their fair share of checks from the Capitals.<\/p>\n

Tampa Bay has apparently not yet read Washington’s memo. On Sunday, Lightning coach Jon Cooper’s squad didn’t hit Carrier a single time. Montreal captain Nick Suzuki<\/a>\u00a0took the most hits among Canadiens players, with just six.<\/p>\n

However, Carrier cautioned that things can change very quickly.<\/p>\n

“It’s a bit less physical than the series against Washington, that could help me,” Carrier said. “I need to stay alert and watch what’s happening around me. When you play big minutes and you get hit on every one of your shifts, it gets tough. I expect a response from the Lightning in the next game. They’ll play more physical and they’ll change up their strategy a bit.”<\/p>\n

With the loss of defenseman Noah Dobson<\/a>, out for at least another week due to an upper-body injury, Montreal desperately needed Carrier to come back.<\/p>\n

Montreal coach Martin St. Louis handed Carrier a rather difficult task on his return to duty. He and Matheson were regularly deployed against the Lightning’s top forward line in Brayden Point<\/a>, Gage Goncalves<\/a>, and Nikita Kucherov<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“That wasn’t an easy situation, but it looked easy for him,” Guhle said regarding Carrier. “He really did a good job after being out a couple of weeks. It was like he hadn’t missed any games at all. He had some nice touches, he played physical, he blocked shots and made good plays. We needed that.”<\/p>\n

Carrier, for his part, remained humble.<\/p>\n

“It’s everybody’s job to give a little more. But I know I’m the only right-handed defenseman while Dobson’s out. In Game 1, we all raised our game.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When it comes to the rough stuff, Carrier has never backed down, but he tends to find himself…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":618480,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194292],"tags":[49,48,2338],"class_list":{"0":"post-618479","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-montreal","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-montreal"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/618479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=618479"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/618479\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/618480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=618479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=618479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=618479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}