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Canadiens vs. Flyers Top Six Minutes: Montreal gives away a win to Philadelphia

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Credit: Eric Bolte-Imagn Images

I’m not sure about these defence pairings Martin St-Louis has come up with, but I suppose we’ll have to see how they do.

First period

Jayden Struble gets caught up ice on the first shift, and Fowler has already had to face one transition rush.
Cole Caufield is given about one-third of the offensive zone all to himself, but Dan Vladar saves the situation.
The checking is tight right now. It’s like watching five fencing matches taking place at once.
Adam Engström is showing good patience tonight, holding the puck on a couple of occasions to allow his teammates to change.
His pass selection will need a little work, however. The one he made to Juraj Slafkovský leaves the forward vulnerable to a hard hit at centre ice from Rasmus Ristolainen. It was clean, but Ivan Demidov still didn’t like it and went after Ristolainen with a cross-check. The rookie will have to sit for two minutes.
Jake Evans looked great on the penalty-kill shift, and it’s nice to see him starting to find his form over the last week or so.
Engström steps up at the blue line and forces the Flyers offside. That’s now how the Canadiens typically play those situations, but they should do that more often.
Montreal had a good second-line shift in the offensive zone, but that ends when Alexandre Carrier trips up Christian Dvorak with the puck back in Montreal’s end. Time for Evans to go back to work.
The Flyers are fighting just to maintain possession in the offensive zone, so they’re not getting much in terms of offence. The Oilers’ power play this is not.
Josh Anderson makes a good decision to carry the puck over the line with speed to back off the defence, then play it back to Evans. Evans whipped the puck across looking for Carrier, but Texier intercepted it from a better position in the slot and ripped it past Dan Vladar to open the scoring.

Another day, another Texier goal

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— Scott Matla (@scottmatla.bsky.social) December 16, 2025 at 8:50 PM

I just praised Anderson, but he was left on the ice for the next shift and didn’t work hard enough to cover his man in the defensive zone as the play turned up ice, gliding back into the slot and making a half-hearted reach with his stick as the puck came across the ice. That allowed Carl Grundstrom to accept the pass at the side of the net and tie the game right back up.
One of those defensive breakdowns that spoils an entire period.

Second period

Anderson is out to start the second period, so I don’t know what message that sends to address the defensive issues.
Demidov tips the puck on a shot from Slafkovský that was sliding wide of the net, but put it off the post.
Sean Couturier latches onto Owen Beck’s stick to prevent Beck from getting to a puck mere feet from the net, and has the audacity to complain to the ref about the call. I still think the refs need to give unsportsmanlike calls that type of behaviour.
The Flyers needed a good defensive play to prevent the puck from reaching Texier for what would have been a three-foot shot.
Demidov makes a poor decision to take the puck away from Carrier in the offensive zone and head back toward the blue line. It results in a two-on-one for Philadelphia’s top two point-producers, and Travis Konecny sets up Trevor Zegras for the go-ahead goal.
These are costly mistakes the Canadiens are making.
Evans sets up another chance for Texier, but Vladar stops him this time.
The Flyers have given up nothing to Montreal’s top line tonight. It’s being completely neutralized.
Gallagher comes out for a shift and gets the puck for a chance. He flubs the first attempt but manages to put the puck on net for a shot at least. He looks good in the opening 25 or 30 seconds of the shift, but doesn’t have the stamina for any more than that.
Montreal only has nine shots through 33 minutes. They’ve allowed a strong defensive team to play with a lead again.
The top line gets its first real chances of the game, but Vladar makes the first save and the secondary setup is picked off by Bobby Brink.
The Bell Centre ice is doing about as much work as the Flyers right now to break up Montreal’s offence. The puck isn’t go where the players intend it to.
Fowler stopped the puck behind his net expecting someone to come take it, but the one who did was Matvei Michkov, setting up Brink for an empty-netter. A full communication breakdown on the play to makes it 3-1.
What is it with the Canadiens playing their worst hockey on nights they can move to first place in the division?

Third period

It’s an angry start to the period for Montreal. They want to make up for one of their mistakes right away.
Another solid shift from Oliver Kapanen’s line has several chances. with the best going to Lane Hutson, whose shot more hits the Flyers netminder than was saved by him.
It’s relentless from Montreal right now. And it needs to be if they’re going to score twice.
The Flyers are desperate for a change after an icing and end up with seven players on the ice, but the refs allow that to happen. Funny, they usually give penalties to the trailing team when it’s Montreal trying to defend a lead.
Every shift is being played in Philadelphia’s zone, but none of that matters if they don’t find a way to put the puck in.
If Montreal learns to defend this well they will be difficult to beat, but it’s going to take some effort.
A full period played in Philadelphia’s zone and it’s Montreal that gets the one penalty. Nick Seeler sees Gallagher’s stick laying across his arm with Gallagher recovering from a hit and decides to pull it up to hit himself in the face.
Anderson and Zegras are going off for coincidental roughing minors.
Konecny hits the empty net and that will stick a form in this game.
Another game in which the Canadiens beat themselves, on a night the Bruins, Maple Leafs, and Red Wings all win. Just a disappointing night overall.
Next up the Canadiens will play the Connor Bedard-less Chicago Blackhawks on Thursday. They need to regroup and snatch up those two points.