{"id":238849,"date":"2026-04-20T12:40:18","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T12:40:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/238849\/"},"modified":"2026-04-20T12:40:18","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T12:40:18","slug":"slafkovsky-emerges-as-big-time-player-in-canadiens-game-1-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/238849\/","title":{"rendered":"Slafkovsky emerges as ‘big-time player’ in Canadiens’ Game 1 win"},"content":{"rendered":"

He also became the first Canadiens player with a playoff hat trick since Rene Bourque<\/a> in Game 5 of the 2014 Eastern Conference Final and the third player in the Canadiens\u2019 rich history to complete a hat trick with an overtime goal, following Eric Desjardins<\/a>\u00a0(Game 2 of the 1993 Stanley Cup Final) and Gerry Plamondon<\/a> (Game 2 of the 1949 semifinals).\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know what \u2018Slaf\u2019 can bring to the table,\u201d Canadiens coach Martin St. Louis said. \u201cHe played true to his identity tonight. It wasn\u2019t just about his goals; he wanted to win, he was physical, he won one-on-one battles, and he had an active, disruptive stick. It was a big game for him.\u201d<\/p>\n

The winning goal came on a wrist shot that beat Tampa Bay goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy<\/a> to the far side, giving Montreal the 1-0 lead in the best-of-7 series. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was kind of open space there, I decided to shoot it and thankfully it went in,\u201d Slafkovsky said. \u00a0<\/p>\n

He scored his first power-play goal with 24 seconds left in the second period, one-timing a blast over Vasilevskiy\u2019s shoulder to tie the game 2-2.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He then gave Montreal a 3-2 lead at 5:56 of the third period, taking a pass in the slot from linemate Cole Caufield<\/a>\u00a0and beating Vasilevskiy.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been unbelievable,\u201d said Canadiens forward Josh Anderson<\/a>, who gave Montreal a 1-0 lead at 13:24 of the first period. \u201cSince last year and this year, obviously taking huge strides. Power forward, a big guy, that you know it\u2019s hard to stop him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lightning defenseman Ryan McDonagh<\/a>\u00a0said it\u2019s even harder to stop Slafkovsky when he\u2019s on a Canadiens power play that was tied for 10th in the NHL at 23.1 percent. Slafkovsky had 28 power-play points and 15 power-play goals in the regular season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We’ve got to start by not putting him on the power play,\u201d McDonagh said. \u201cYou ask any top player, they like feeling the puck and making things happen with that extra time and space. So, just keep playing him hard all over the ice.”<\/p>\n

St. Louis, the only coach Slafkovsky has had in the NHL, said his progression has been something to watch. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYou understand that when you\u2019re dealing with young players, talented players like that, I think as a coach you have to patience, empathy, whatever it is,\u201d St. Louis said. \u201cBut the goal is always to be advancing and growing and understanding, it\u2019s not going to be linear. There were some ups and dips, but as he\u2019s evolved the last year, there\u2019s not a lot of dips.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"He also became the first Canadiens player with a playoff hat trick since Rene Bourque in Game 5…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":238850,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-238849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=238849"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238849\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/238850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}