By Canadian Press

Senators hold off Canadiens’ late surge to earn 3-2 victory

Dec 14, 2022 | 8:59 PM

OTTAWA — The Ottawa Senators survived a late push from the Montreal Canadiens to pick up their third straight win, 3-2 on Wednesday night.

Shane Pinto, Drake Batherson and Brady Tkachuk each scored for Ottawa (13-14-2), while Alex DeBrincat had three assists. Cam Talbot made 23 saves.

The Canadiens (14-13-2) rallied to make it a game with a pair of third-period goals from Kirby Dach and Christian Dvorak, but were unable to score the equalizer. Sam Montembeault stopped 28 shots.

Trailing 3-0 in the third, the Canadiens finally solved Talbot at 8:05 of the period, sending the partisan Montreal crowd into a frenzy. Dach glided into the slot and buried it off a Jake Evans pass.

The Canadiens made it a one-goal game when Dvorak beat Talbot on a delayed penalty call at 13:12 of the third.

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Heading into the second period, the Senators trailed the Canadiens 10-6 in shots. But after 40 minutes, Ottawa not only held a 23-13 edge in shots, but a 3-0 lead.

Montembeault robbed Pinto on a point-blank shot, but moments later, the Senators forward took a great feed from Nikita Zaitsev and and scored off the post 1:28 into the second.

Batherson made it 2-0 with a power-play goal at 5:41 of the frame, when he scored through his own legs in front of the net. Tkachuk added Ottawa’s second power-play marker when he tipped home a DeBrincat pass just over two minutes later.

DeBrincat picked up primary assists on all three Ottawa goals to extend his point streak to seven games (three goals, seven assists). Batherson, meanwhile, pushed his point streak to six games (three goals, five assists).

Montreal committed five minor penalties in the second period after getting off to a solid start.

The Canadiens dominated the opening ten minutes of the contest, but couldn’t find a way to beat Talbot.

INTERESTING FACT OR STAT

Jacob Lucchini made his NHL debut Wednesday night. The 27-year-old got the experience of taking a rookie lap during warmups. He spent two years with the Laval Rocket, Montreal’s farm team in the AHL.

NOTES: The Senators will be without Tim Stutzle for at least a week as he recovers from a shoulder contusion after being hit by the Ducks’ Brett Leason on Monday night. The news wasn’t as good for Tyler Motte as he went down hard Monday and is expected to miss at least a week with an undisclosed upper body injury … Jonathan Drouin returned to Montreal’s lineup after missing 13 games with an upper-body injury.

UP NEXT

The Senators head to Detroit to take on the Red Wings Saturday afternoon, while Montreal will host the Anaheim Ducks Thursday night.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 14, 2022.

Lisa Wallace, The Canadian Press