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Pregame: Canadiens vs Penguins |
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Follow me @KarineHains for all updates about the Montreal Canadiens and women's hockey
Josh Anderson will be back in the line-up tonight having finished serving his 2-game suspension. Mike Pezzetta will yet again be a healthy scratch, meaning that Jonathan Drouin will move down to the 4th line and that Anderson will play alongside Sean Monahan and Evgeni Dadonov. The other two lines remain unchanged as the Caufield-Suzuki-Dach has been on fire since starting to play together and Mike Hoffman has got 3 goals in 2 games playing alongside Christian Dvorak and Brendan Gallagher.
On the blue line, things remain unchanged. Martin St-Louis says that he doesn’t want to mess up with his recipe. Guhle and Savard are playing well together, so are Harris and Kovacevic and since Wideman is the odd man-out, Edmundson and Xhekaj will get another chance to build some chemistry. Another big decision is looming for the head coach though as Mike Matheson took part in practice even though he was wearing a no-contact jersey. Soon, someone else will have to make way for the veteran.
Tonight, Juraj Slavkovsky will be serving the second of his two-game suspension which means he’ll be eligible to return against the Devils on Tuesday night. His return to the line-up will no doubt push someone out, and the way things are going, it should probably be Evgeni Dadonov, although Jonathan Drouin is the one who’ll be on 4th line duty against the Pens.
When Mike Matheson is activated from IR, Kent Hughes will have to make some room for him on the 23-man roster, will a veteran suffer the Pitlick treatment? Have all the young defensemen played well enough to warrant waiving Chris Wideman? He was clearly signed to be the 7th D and be a mentor to the kids, but it’s hard to imagine the Habs carrying 8 defensemen on the roster. At the same time, would it be wise to keep a youngster in a 7th D role? Wouldn’t it be harmful to his development? Or should we expect a rotation with Xhekaj and Kovacevic alternating in and out of the line-up?
Xhekaj could be sent down without going through waivers, but such a move would be underserved…Waiving Kovacevic could mean losing him and given the Canadiens’ lack of depth on the right side, it may be a gamble Hughes is not willing to take.
Before this gets sorted out though, the Habs will be taking on the Penguins who have been a disappointment so far this year. While their star forwards are producing as expected (Crosby, Malkin and Guentzel are leading in points), their defense has been far from reliable and the same can be said of their goaltending. However, they come to town having won their last two games against the Capitals and the Leafs. Jeff Petry will be hoping to have a better game than the last time he came to town when he got a couple of costly penalties.
Montreal Canadiens Blogger • 
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