The Montreal Canadiens were putting pressure on Ty Conklin right from the opening faceoff and when the Wings had a chance to score Carey Price stopped them cold.Price made 32 saves, and Maxim Lapierre, Tomas Plekanec and Christopher Higgins all scored goals in the second period."We didn't forecheck,'' Plekanec said."We stayed in the neutral zone and tried to make them make turnovers and we did a great job."Montreal coach Guy Carbonneau told his team to be very patient with the puck.''Detroit's a team that likes to control the puck,'' Carbonneau said. ''Just tried to play as tough as we can in the neutral zone and make them dump it in.''Johan Franzen scored in the third for Detroit, and Ty Conklin stopped 22 shots in the lose.
''I thought they played their system real well,'' Red Wings defenceman Nicklas Lidstrom said. ''I think we saw their first play was right at the red line and they were backing off and not giving us any speed through the neutral zone. Once we got the puck in we lost a lot of 1-on-1 battles in the corners, couldn't sustain that pressure that we wanted to.''Lapierre scored the first goal of the game just 5:23 into the second period when his pass from behind the net deflected in off Lidstrom's skate.''You get the puck to the net and good things are going to happen,'' Conklin said. ''Bad things, in our case. Not a whole lot went well for us certainly at the other end.''Plekanec's power-play goal made the score become 2-0. ''It put us up 2-0 and created breathing room for us,'' Plekanec said.Higgins scored to make it be 3-0 off a weak bakehand that somehow passed Conklin.
''I'm a big believer in creating your own good bounces,'' Higgins said. ''We played our positions and were able to take advantage of them.''Later in the third period Franzen decked passed all the Canadiens defense to make it be 3-1 and break Price's shutout.''It's tough, but two points is more important,'' Price said.
The Canadiens next game will be on Friday against the Capitals.
Written By Andrew Di Pardo
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