Lightning vs Canadiens shifts to the Centre Bell tied 1-1: “Somebody’s gotta be the villain”
Absolute cinema.
Absolute cinema feels like an appropriate description of the first two games of the Montreal Canadiens and Tampa Bay Lightning’s first round bout. This boiling of this rivalry has been in the making the past 22 years, dating back to their first meeting in 2004, a decisive Lightning victory on their way to winning the franchise’s first Stanley Cup. The teams broke each others’ hearts in the 2014 and 2015 playoffs, but the Lightning got the last laugh in 2021 when they dominated the Stanley Cup Final and effectively ended Carey Price and Shea Weber’s careers. Ever since that Stanley Cup Final, the Canadiens have been in a rebuild while the Lightning have failed to win a playoff series since 2022.
Which leads us to present day. Our first hint that this series would be nasty came on April 9, 2026. The Canadiens and Lightning, fighting neck and neck for the Atlantic Division, combined for 126 penalty minutes in a 2-1 Montreal win that saw Cole Caufield score his 50th goal for the Habs.
The series has obviously not disappointed.
The two teams have shown each other much more hatred than the 80 combined penalty minutes would suggest. The referees have mostly left scrums unpenalized. The key for both clubs will be to keep that fire heading into Montreal while staying disciplined enough to avoid inexplicable penalties (Lightning franchise superstar Nikita Kucherov was fortunate in game 2 not to have taken more penalties for his reckless actions).
In game one, each team received five power play opportunities. The Canadiens capitalized with three power play goals while the Lightning scored two. Crucially, one of the Canadiens power plays came in overtime, on which Juraj Slafkovsky scored the overtime winner.
Before game two, the Lightning decided they were really going to muck it up with the high-flying Canadiens by inserting Scott Sabourin into the lineup. For those who follow the Lightning, Sabourin’s role is very clear: he is a goon meant whose only purpose is to agitate opponents with occasionally dirty hits, as his 89 penalty minutes and 7:57 TOI average would suggest. His primary target in game two? Josh Anderson.
Anderson and Brandon Hagel have surprisingly been the two main characters of the series. Both players have scored in both games and have been at the center of almost all the scrums in the series. Slafkovsky, the hero of game one, and Hagel even engaged in a fight in game two, a throwdown in which Slafkovsky landed most of the punches but one in which Hagel got the takedown. Hagel, for all intents and purposes, will serve as the ‘villain’ in this series’s story.
If the Lightning want a chance, however, to keep up with the Canadiens, they will need Nikita Kucherov to assume the role of primary villain. Kucherov has been borderline heroic at times for the Lightning this season, registering 130 points in a campaign that very well could secure just his second Hart trophy. However, in the playoffs, Kucherov’s lack of goal-scoring has proved dire for the Lightning in their four first round exits. Before game 2, Kucherov had played 16 postseason games without a goal. His breakthrough in game 2, in which he scored the tying goal that sent the game to overtime, saw an exuberant expression of emotion and relief from the Russian star.
Kucherov is no stranger to being public enemy no.1 in Montreal. After the Lightning won the Stanley Cup in 2021 against the Canadiens, his public comments were discussed all summer and was arguably the genesis of his villain status leaguewide.
“The fans in Montreal acted like they won the Stanley Cup last game. Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? Their final was last round.”
– Nikita Kucherov, 2021
Despite having never played the Canadiens, Lightning forward Jake Guentzel has already played and excelled in playoff-style games at Centre Bell. With team USA at the Four-Nations tournament last February, the forward scored two crucial goals for the Americans in a victory that silenced the arena and the whole nation. Ironically, Hagel and Lightning superstar Brayden Point, as well as Head Coach Jon Cooper, were all with team Canada and were celebrated as heroes by that same arena when Canada won the Four Nations the next week (Hagel, in particularly, for fighting Matthew Tkachuk in a legendary throwdown).
Should the Canadiens win the series, their franchise duo, Cole Caufield and Nick Suzuki, will have to do a bit more.
After game two, Cooper acknowledged the reality that his team had become the new Florida Panthers, the new villains of the NHL. “Somebody’s gotta be the villain, I guess. We’re OK with it.” If he wants his club to be a successful villain and take down Montreal, he will need Kucherov to become the face of that evil.
