Canadiens fall flat in letdown loss after clinching playoff spot

By Canadian Press on April 5, 2026.

MONTREAL — The stage was set for a special night in Montreal.

The Canadiens returned from an undefeated road trip riding an eight-game winning streak. Cole Caufield was on the brink of 50 goals. And just hours before puck drop, the young, talented team had clinched a playoff berth with games to spare.

The crowd was buzzing from warm-ups. Then the Canadiens fell flat.

Montreal lost 3-0 to the New Jersey Devils on Sunday, snapping its winning streak in a letdown night, especially for fans who paid a premium for a last-minute ticket hoping to witness history.

“It’s always a tough first game back at home after a really long road trip,” captain Nick Suzuki said. “Everyone’s excited, the fans were into it. I think we just didn’t go out there and execute, and it could have been a better homecoming for sure.”

The Canadiens, coming off a 4-3 shootout win over New Jersey on Saturday, registered just eight shots in the first two periods and finished 0-for-4 on the power play.

That came hours after the Detroit Red Wings fell 5-4 to the Minnesota Wild in a matinee, helping the Canadiens become the first Canadian team to secure a playoff berth this season.

“I can’t say exactly what it is, but we’ve been playing a lot of hockey at a pretty good level. Back-to-back, we come back from a trip, you wake up from your nap and you clinch a spot,” said coach Martin St. Louis, listing the possible factors. “We didn’t have our fastball tonight, but it’s not like we played badly. Our execution wasn’t there.”

Caufield remained one goal shy of becoming the first Canadien to reach the half-century mark since Stéphane Richer in 1990 for the second straight game after scoring his 48th and 49th on Thursday against the New York Rangers.

Fans crowded the glass during warm-ups with signs, including one spectator holding up the No. 50 in big gold birthday balloons.

The Bell Centre erupted when Caufield appeared on the big screen, and again when he jumped over the boards for his first shift just over one minute into the game. Chants of “Cau-field! Cau-field!” quickly followed.

On the ice, meanwhile, his teammates pushed for an assist on the milestone. Perhaps a little too much.

“You feel it,” defenceman Kaiden Guhle said. “You see the signs in the crowd. Even (Saturday) in New Jersey, there was a lot. A little extra buzz, but I think we’re just playing. I don’t think anyone’s really trying to force it to him.”

St. Louis, however, felt his players were “looking for (Caufield) a lot.”

“It affects a little bit of the continuity of some plays,” he said. “I have a lot of confidence that he’ll score 50. We would have loved for it to happen (Sunday), for a lot of reasons. So that we could move on to other things, and offer that to the crowd. It would have been fun to give them that.”

Despite the letdown, Montreal (45-22-10) sits third in the Atlantic Division with 100 points, firmly in the mix to secure home-ice advantage and two points back of the Tampa Bay Lightning for the division lead with one more game played. The Canadiens play their next three games at home, starting Tuesday against the fading Florida Panthers.

“I want to win the rest of the games,” Suzuki said. “Possibly having a chance to finish first in the division, home-ice advantage is big.

“We got guys getting healthier and we got some big games coming up at home. Now is a big opportunity for us to go out there and play some of our best hockey down the stretch.”

St. Louis doesn’t expect his group to change much in the final five games.

“We’re still in a place where we could win our division, we can go get home-ice advantage,” he said. “To lower the level and wait, and then to say, ‘OK, the playoffs are starting, we have to bring it back up.’ I think that’s a trap, you have to be careful.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 5, 2026.

Daniel Rainbird, The Canadian Press