{"id":679623,"date":"2026-05-19T12:42:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T12:42:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/679623\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T12:42:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T12:42:11","slug":"what-the-puck-canadiens-fans-blow-lid-off-bell-centre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/679623\/","title":{"rendered":"What the Puck: Canadiens fans blow lid off Bell Centre"},"content":{"rendered":"

The magical Dobes Spring continues.<\/p>\n

Two weeks ago, I was tentatively saying maybe we should be calling this the Dobes Spring<\/a> in honour of rookie Canadiens goalie Jakub Dobes, but I wondered if that was a bit over the top. Well, apparently it isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

The Canadiens beat the Buffalo Sabres 3-2 in Game 7 of the second-round series Monday and advanced to meet the Carolina Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference final, which begins Thursday in Raleigh, N.C. Dobes stopped 37 of 39 shots<\/a>, and everyone I spoke to after the watch party at the Bell Centre said the victory was all about the extraordinary play of the Habs\u2019 Czech goalie.<\/p>\n

\"CanadiensCanadiens fans celebrate the Habs\u2019 Game 7 win over the Buffalo Sabres at the Bell Centre in Montreal on Monday night. Evan Buhler \/ Montreal Gazette<\/p>\n

Wassem Zahra was shouting when I spoke with him just after the end of the OT.<\/p>\n

\u201cDobes is the GOAT; Dobes is the GOAT,\u201d said Zahra. \u201cThank you, Dobes, thank you. We love you. I love him. We all love him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Well, that\u2019s clear enough and pretty much the majority sentiment in Montreal at this moment \u2014 Dobes is the greatest of all time.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Newcomb just couldn\u2019t believe what happened.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe OT, I couldn\u2019t stand it. My heart was beating out of my chest,\u201d said Newcomb. \u201cI didn\u2019t even see the puck go in. I just saw everyone go up and I jumped up, and it was crazy. I think it just goes to show how much this city loves hockey and how much it means to this city. We sold out the Bell Centre and they\u2019re not even playing here. You walk around the city, everyone has Habs flags, all the buses have \u2018Go Habs Go.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cThe (team) performs best when everyone is together, and nothing brings Montreal together like the Montreal Canadiens,\u201d Newcomb added. \u201cWe\u2019re the youngest team to make the playoffs and we\u2019re going to go all the way. I truly believe it. Everyone had Tampa beating us and going all the way. I think it just goes to show how Martin St. Louis treats his players. He puts trust in them and they reward that. They come through for him.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Alex Newhook scored the series-winning goal<\/a> in overtime, his second Game 7 winner of this playoff run. That\u2019s pretty amazing. It was a game that, in many ways, the Canadiens didn\u2019t deserve to win. They were completely outplayed by the Sabres during the second and third periods, but came to life in overtime. It\u2019s just been that kind of a wild run for the team. They won Game 7 against the Tampa Bay Lightning <\/a>even though they only managed nine shots in the game. In both cases, the reason they won was the self-proclaimed goofy goalie between the pipes. The guy who says he\u2019s no hero, just a goofball who plays hockey and then goes home and watches Game of Thrones. Yeah, right.<\/p>\n

Don Thompson, who\u2019s been a Habs fan since he first saw them play the Flyers in Philly as a kid, came up from Atlantic City, N.J., to see the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cI go anywhere and everywhere to see (the Canadiens),\u201d said Thompson. \u201cI have to go home tomorrow, but I will be back on Monday.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Monday, the Canadiens will host their first game of the conference final against the Hurricanes.<\/p>\n

I told him I was having my doubts during the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was nervous in the third period; I was nervous in the overtime,\u201d said Thomson. \u201cYou know what? The goaltending advantage was always ours. After they beat Tampa, I thought nobody can stop them except maybe the (Colorado) Avalanche, but that\u2019s for another day. Words can\u2019t describe it. It\u2019s been forever since they\u2019ve been this good. This has just been a dream season. The youngest team in the league. They talked about a rebuild, and here we are. The rebuild is over.\u201d<\/p>\n

Heather McIntosh said she was worried it was going to go to a second overtime period.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was getting nervous,\u201d said McIntosh. \u201cBut I felt they would win today. Was I right?\u201d<\/p>\n

I told her she was.<\/p>\n

McIntosh\u2019s friend, Andrea Stebens, said she just loves the fan base.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s nothing better than Canadiens fans,\u201d said Stebens. \u201cThey\u2019re a great young team. They\u2019re going to go places, and Dobes is something to be reckoned with. I just love that man. He\u2019s an amazing goalie. He takes no crap from anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Montr\u00e9al Canadiens celebrate their overtime win over the Buffalo Sabres in Game 7 at KeyBank Center in Buffalo on Monday night. Joed Viera \/ Buffalo News<\/p>\n

There really is something magical going on here. After they took a 2-0 lead, the Canadiens didn\u2019t play a great game. They lacked intensity. But Dobes kept them in it with the kind of heroics that have become routine for this dude \u2014 and then when it counted, the Habs came through in the overtime. There is something about the Canadiens, about their spirit, about the family coach St. Louis has built.<\/p>\n

Even management didn\u2019t think this was going to happen. If they had, they would\u2019ve picked up some pieces at the deadline. They thought the contending was coming next year or maybe the year after. But as the Lightning and the Sabres discovered, you should never underestimate these underdogs. Sure, it\u2019s Dobes, but it\u2019s also the team spirit. There\u2019s just no giving up with these young players.<\/p>\n

Someone better tell the Hurricanes. On second thought, don\u2019t tell them.<\/p>\n

bkelly@postmedia.com<\/p>\n

\t\tEditor\u2019s Picks\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The magical Dobes Spring continues. Two weeks ago, I was tentatively saying maybe we should be calling this…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":679624,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194292],"tags":[49,48,2338],"class_list":["post-679623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-montreal","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-montreal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679623","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=679623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/679624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=679623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=679623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=679623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}