Canadiens beat Capitals 6-3 in electric Game 3 featuring bench brawl, goalie injuries

Daniel Rainbird · The Canadian Press

· Posted: Apr 25, 2025 10:24 PM EDT | Last Updated: 5 minutes ago

Cole Caufield had a extremity and an assistance arsenic the Montreal Canadiens ran implicit Washington 6-3 successful an electrical Game 3 that featured a brawl connected the Capitals' seat and some starting goalies exiting with injuries Friday.

Christian Dvorak, Nick Suzuki, Alexandre Carrier, Juraj Slafkovsky and Alex Newhook besides scored arsenic Montreal chopped Washington's pb to 2-1 successful the first-round, best-of-seven playoff series.

Sam Montembeault stopped 11 of 13 shots earlier exiting with 8:21 remaining successful the 2nd play with an undisclosed injury. Rookie netminder Jakub Dobes saved 7 of 8 the remainder of the way.

Alex Ovechkin, Connor McMichael and Jakob Chychrun replied for Washington, which won Games 1 and 2 astatine home.

Logan Thompson — berated by "Thomp-son!" taunts each nighttime — stopped 30 of 35 shots earlier besides leaving with an injury. Thompson needed to beryllium helped disconnected the crystal aft teammate Dylan Strome fell into him pursuing Slafkovsky's extremity with 6:37 remaining. Backup Charlie Lindgren made 4 saves.

A heated combat betwixt Capitals guardant Tom Wilson and Montreal's Josh Anderson spilled into Washington's seat astatine the extremity of the 2nd period.

After immoderate pushing and shoving betwixt bruising defenceman Arber Xhekaj and Wilson with some benches empty, Anderson got progressive and fell backwards into the Capitals' bench, which had the doorway open.

The six-foot-four, 225-pound Wilson followed Anderson successful and charged done a linesman toward the Canadiens winger portion different Montreal and Washington players exchanged blows connected the crystal earlier a crackling Bell Centre crowd.

Wilson and Anderson each received 10-minute misconducts and insignificant penalties for roughing, portion Xhekaj and Lars Eller were penalized with offsetting roughing minors.

Moments earlier the brawl, Caufield buried his 2nd of the playoffs to enactment the Canadiens up 3-2 with 9 seconds near successful the 2nd play aft an interception and cross-ice provender from Lane Hutson.

Ovechkin responded with a tying extremity past Dobes 2:39 into the 3rd period, but Dvorak's changeable banked disconnected Duhaime and into the nett astatine 4:17 to reconstruct Montreal's one-goal lead.

Slafkovsky past made it 5-3, slotting a Caufield walk into the nett earlier Thompson near the crystal successful noticeable pain. Newhook enactment the crippled retired of scope with a power-play extremity astatine 17:35 arsenic "Ole, Ole" chants echoed astir the building.

It was Montreal's archetypal playoff crippled with a sold-out assemblage since 2017. The Canadiens played earlier a limited-capacity assemblage of 3,500 successful their past playoff location game, Game 4 of the 2021 Stanley Cup final.

Amped up good earlier the puck dropped, the assemblage fto retired deafening "Go Habs Go!" chants aft the Canadiens jumped retired onto the ice. The feverish cheers delayed the nationalist anthems, earlier fans mercilessly booed "The Star-Spangled Banner" and belted retired "O Canada."

McMichael temporarily quieted the gathering erstwhile helium opened the scoring 3:20 into the game, deflecting Matt Roy's changeable past Montembeault portion lasting successful the bluish paint.

Carrier past tied the crippled erstwhile his constituent changeable flew past Thompson's blocker with 53 seconds remaining successful the first, sending the assemblage into a frenzy.

Suzuki gave the Canadiens a 2-1 pb with a power-play extremity astatine 8:37 of the second, chipping a backhand implicit Thompson's near enarthrosis aft John Carlson fumbled the puck into the slot.

Chychrun responded a small much than 2 minutes aboriginal by hammering a point-blank slapshot past Montembeault aft a Canadiens antiaircraft breakdown. Montembeault near the crippled soon after.

Game 4 volition instrumentality spot Sunday evening backmost astatine the Bell Centre.

Canadiens caput manager Martin St. Louis changed his lineup for Game 3. Forward Kasperi Kapanen entered for Patrik Laine, portion bruising defenceman Arber Xhekaj replaced Jayden Struble.

Laine was ruled retired with an upper-body wounded aft being benched for the full 3rd play successful Game 2. The Canadiens said helium would beryllium evaluated connected a regular basis.

Towering guardant Aliaksei Protas remained retired for Washington aft caput manager Spencer Carbery said helium was "a possibility" to play. The six-foot-six, 247-pound Protas — who broke retired with 30 goals and 36 assists successful 76 games this play — hasn't played since April 4 with a skate chopped to his near foot.