Montreal Canadiens to Face Familiar Foe Tonight

The Montreal Canadiens season is not going well so they need to look for extra motivation every single night because looking at the standings is not going to fire anyone up.

Tonight’s game is a Saturday night contest and though it is being played in St. Louis, Canadian teams know when they are being watched across the country on Hockey Night in Canada. Of course, for this year’s Canadiens that is probably a scary thought for most.

But, they shouldn’t have to look far to try and find a little extra effort to not get shutout again, like they did in their most recent game against the Chicago Blackhawks, which was a 2-0 loss on home ice on Thursday night.

Tonight, they will face a familiar opponent as Charlie Lindgren is likely to be in goal for the Blues. Lindgren was in the Canadiens organization for five seasons after a stellar college career with the St. Cloud State Huskies.

He spent most of that time in the American Hockey League, but Lindgren did play 25 games with the Canadiens during his time with the organization. His numbers with the Canadiens weren’t fantastic as he barely kept his GAA below 3.00 and his SV% was just over .900.

Lindgren left the Canadiens organization this past offseason and signed with the St. Louis Blues. He started the year with their AHL affiliate, the Springfield Thunderbirds and he played terrific. In ten games, he posted a 2.16 GAA and a .925 SV%. He is still fourth on the Blues organizational depth chart in goal, but he is the starter for this team in the short term.

Jordan Binnington would normally be the team’s number one but he is in Covid-19 protocol and his backup Ville Husso is out with a lower body injury. Joel Hofer would be next in line, but he can’t be called up due to salary cap constraints so the cheaper Lindgren got the call earlier this week.

He started, and played quite well, against the Detroit Red Wings in his first career start for the Blues on Thursday. Lindgren stopped 29 of 31 shots in the Blues 6-2 victory. He also came on in relief of Husso on Tuesday and stopped all three shots he faced and earned the win over the Florida Panthers in overtime.

So, the 27 year old is playing as good as he ever has and he will face his former team tonight. You know he will be motivated for a big game, so the Canadiens who are struggling offensively are going to have to dig deep to beat their former teammate.