(Picture credit score: Winslow Townson-USA TODAY Sports activities)
Connor Bedard will make his first journey north of america border when the Chicago Blackhawks go to the Montreal Canadiens on Saturday evening.
Bedard, the extremely touted No. 1 general choose by Chicago within the 2023 NHL Draft, notched his first NHL objective in a 3-1 loss on the Boston Bruins on Wednesday, a day after producing his first help in a 4-2 victory on the Pittsburgh Penguins.
“He is a extremely nice participant,” Boston ahead Milan Lucic stated. “Actually elite ability, elite skater, nice imaginative and prescient … clearly an unbelievable shot. He is solely two video games in, however I believe he will maintain getting higher and higher, and he will be the true deal.”
The Blackhawks will likely be trying to enhance on their energy play, which is 0-for-7. However they will have to get untracked with out certainly one of their key gamers on the person benefit.
Taylor Corridor sustained an upper-body damage after taking a success from Bruins defenseman Brandon Carlo 24 seconds into the second interval however had improved sufficient by Friday to be thought of extra of a day-to-day state of affairs an upper-body damage. Nonetheless, he has been dominated out for Saturday’s sport.
“It was unlucky,” Blackhawks coach Luke Richardson stated. “We simply need to plow by means of. He was enjoying rather well for us.”
Andreas Athanasiou stuffed Corridor’s spot on the highest power-play unit towards Boston and likewise moved as much as the highest line.
The Canadiens misplaced their season opener 6-5 in a shootout towards the Toronto Maple Leafs on Wednesday.
Alex Newhook had two targets and Cole Caufield, Jake Evans and Jesse Ylonen additionally scored for Montreal, which let a 5-3 lead with slightly below 5 minutes remaining slip away.
The Canadiens briefly thought they went up 3-0 with a power-play objective 5:50 into the second interval, however Toronto efficiently challenged that Montreal was offsides previous to the objective.
“That is not simple to be up 3-0 after which subsequent factor , you are down 3-2 multi function interval,” Montreal defenseman Mike Matheson stated. “That is sort of what we talked about within the second interval — this can be a take a look at, and the way are we going to reply? And I assumed we responded nice.
“We had a two-goal lead with six, seven minutes left, no matter it was, and that is an enormous studying expertise. It isn’t a straightforward capsule to swallow, however undoubtedly one which we now have to take.”
The Maple Leafs pulled their goalie with 4:45 remaining and Auston Matthews scored his second objective of the sport 13 seconds later earlier than finishing a hat trick on the tying objective with 1:07 remaining.
Montreal additionally was upset it couldn’t reap the benefits of an influence play over the ultimate 1:47 of time beyond regulation.
“We have to seek out methods to maintain on transferring ahead and maintain rolling the way in which we have been rolling,” stated Montreal heart Kirby Dach, who had two assists. “We took our foot off the gasoline pedal.”
Matheson stated it would take a while for the younger Canadiens to learn to shut out victories.
“It is nonetheless the NHL and it is nonetheless a extremely laborious league,” Matheson stated. “So, whether or not it is your first 12 months, second 12 months, eighth 12 months, there’s all the time issues to be taught and I believe our objective should not be … to be 50 p.c higher in Sport 1. It is bought to be three p.c, 4 p.c higher, and incrementally maintain constructing off the place we have been final 12 months.”
