New York Rangers Look to Keep Momentum in Montreal

After a comfortable 4-1 victory over the Chicago Blackhawks for their first win of the new year, the Blueshirts are in Montreal for an original-six showdown (7:00PM on MSG2)

Rangers	Rankings	Canadiens
26-10-1	Record	16-17-5
2nd	League Rank	25th
9th	Goals For	27th
6th	Goals Against	27th
1st	Power play	22nd
7th	Penalty Kill	31st

Previous Game

New York defeated Connor Bedard, and the Chicago Blackhawks by the score of 4-1 in their previous game. Artemi Panarin and Vincent Trocheck led the way for the Rangers with two points each. Brennan Othmann didn’t record a point in his NHL debut, but the rookie winger did not look out of place and he did have the most shots on goal in the game with five. Igor Shesterkin recorded 21 saves on the way to his 16th win of the season. Shesterkin was also named to his second straight all-star game just prior to puck drop.

Rangers vs Montreal

The Rangers will now travel north of the border for a meeting with the Canadiens. Former Ranger Martin St. Louis remains as Montreal’s head coach, and former Rangers general manager Jeff Gorton remains high in the Montreal organization. New York was scored on in the last game by former Ranger Colin Blackwell, and Brady Skjei recorded three points against the team that drafted him on Tuesday. Brendan Lemieux also recorded a point against his former team. St. Louis and Gorton would love to continue the trend with a win on Saturday night. Luckily for New York, Montreal doesn’t have an ex-Ranger on their active roster.

Leading the Canadiens in points is their captain Nick Suzuki. Suzuki has 34 points in 38 games played, and his 12 goals are the most on the team. His winger, Cole Caufield, currently has eleven goals and 27 points on the season. He is tied for the second most points on the team with defenseman Mike Matheson.

Samuel Montembeault will get the start for the Canadiens. Montembeault has a record of 8-5-3 with a .903 save percentage on the season. The 27-year-old has a career record of 3-0-1 against the Rangers with a .910 save percentage.

Jonathan Quick will be back in goal for the Rangers. Quick has lost his last two decisions after starting the season 9-0-1. The veteran netminder has let in four goals in each of those two games. While that doesn’t sound good, the Rangers defense was poor in each of those games and Quick kept the score from getting worse.

One player currently streaking is Artemi Panarin who has a six-game point scoring streak. The Russian winger also has a six-game point scoring streak against the Canadiens including two multi-point games in that stretch.

Quietly going under the radar is Chris Kreider who has an eight-game point scoring streak, including goals in each of the past three games. Kreider has eleven points in the past eight games. The Rangers winger isn’t a popular figure in Montreal due to an incident with former Canadiens netminder Carey Price during the Eastern Conference Finals in 2014. Kreider has a goal in each of the previous three games against Montreal.

Kaapo Kakko continues to make progress as he made the trip with the team to Montreal. Kakko continues to skate in a non-contact jersey at practice and he took reps as the 8th defenseman on Saturday afternoon.

Rangers prospects Gabe Perreault and Drew Fortescue won the gold medal at the World Juniors with Team USA on Friday. Perreault had 10 points in the tournament which was tied four the fourth most in the tournament. Forescue, a 6 ‘2 left-handed defenseman, was selected in the third round by the Rangers in the 2023 draft and he recorded four points in the tournament. He will return to Boston College with Perreault for the remainder of the season.

The bet of the night – We could go with Artemi Panarin again as he has a point streak and is playing one of the worst defensive teams in the league. His line at the over is 1.5 points at +114 odds. However, the bet we are going to go with is Chris Kreider to record over .5 power play points at +290. Montreal takes the 5th most penalties and they have the 31st ranked penalty kill in the league. A $5 bet will win 19.50 for a $14.50 profit.

Current record: 14-7

Current Money Total (Based on $5 bets) – We are up $45.70 on the season