Canadiens Hope to Silence Tampa’s Thunder

Vincent Lecavalier, Alex Tanguay and Matthias Ohlund hope to get a “charge” to to their season when the face the Canadiens on Saturday. – photo: Getty Images

The Tampa Bay Lightning (5-4-5) will be looking to make some noise when they face the Montreal Canadiens (8-8-0) Saturday night at the Bell Centre.

The Lightning are on a four game road trip, that has seen them go 1-1-1 thus far, after an overtime loss on Thursday night to the Ottawa Senators.

Saturday’s game also marks another return to Montreal for local boys Martin St. Louis and Vincent Lecavalier, and will also be the first game back in Montreal for Alex Tanguay.

Tanguay was left as an unrestricted free agent the Canadiens, this past summer, after racking up 41 points in 50 games for the Bleu-Blanc et Rouge last season.

After 14 games this season, the Ste. Justine native has seven points (2 goals, 5 assists), and six points in his last six games.

Lecavalier, speculation of many a trade rumor to Montreal, has 2 goals and 10 assists in fourteen games.

The 29-year-old has been criticized by many as to having a slow start to the season since his eleven-year contract extension kicked in on July 1. That contract pays him $10 million a season over the next seven years.

The hot hand for the Lightning is 2008 first-round pick Steve Stamkos.

After a great second half in 2008-09, the Markham, ON native leads his team in scoring with 17 points(12 goals) and is tied for the league lead in power play goals with six.

2009 first-round pick Victor Hedman is listed as day-to-day, with an upper body injury suffered on Thursday, and will not play Saturday night.

"I don't want to risk anything," Hedman said Friday. "It's day to day. There's still a lot of games left in the season, so I'm not going to play."

Fellow blueliner Paul Ranger has left the team for personal reasons and Matthias Ohlund missed Friday’s practice for a therapy day but will start on Saturday.

Anterro Niittymaki will get the start in goal for the Lightning, and is 1-0-2 with a 1.60 GAA and .950 SvPct in his last four games.

The Finnish netminder is is 3-1-2 with a 2.09 GAA on the season, but only 1-8-1 with a 3.53 in ten career games against the Canadiens.

Mike Cammalleri and Tomas Plekanec lead the Canadiens’ offensive attack with 14 points each.

Carey Price, who came off a confidence building 2-1 win on Thursday against Boston, will make his second straight start.

The injury-riddled Canadiens defence showed some support for their goaltender on Thursday night, and gained some reinforcement and positive news on Friday.

Jay Roach was picked up off waivers, from New Jersey, but will not play on Saturday.

Defenseman Ryan O’Byrne has started skating on his own Friday, and should be back in a couple weeks.

After a great first-career-game on Thursday, Tom Pyatt and Ryan White will both see action again on Saturday which leaves Kyle Chipchura and Gregory Stewart as healthy scratches.

The Canadiens and Lightning split their four games in 2008-09 with both Montreal wins coming in overtime and a shootout.

Gametime is 7pm at the Bell Centre and will be telecast on CBC and RDS in Canada and on SUN in the U.S.

Canadiens/Lightning deal could depend on Islanders first round pick.

Tampa Bay Lightning GM Brain Lawton and Habs GM Bob Gainey

T-minus 47 hours and counting until the start of the 2009 NHL Draft.

As team general managers and staff from all thirty teams, as well as top prospects expected to go in the first rounds ascend on the Bell Centre, the trade rumors circulate more and more.

For Canadiens fans, the “topic-des-last six months” has been Viincent LeCavalier coming to Montreal.

An apparent deal between Montreal and the Tampa Bay Lightning was killed when names of players the Canadiens were planning to move were made public.

Habs' GM Bob Gainey pointed fingers at Tampa GM Brian Lawton for leaking the names after Montreal’s season ended.

Lawton quickly dismissed the allegations.

With the Lightning struggling in the bank account, it seems imminent that they will move their franchise player before his no-trade clause kicks on July 1.

Despite the verbal exchange between Lawton and Gainey, a Montreal-Tampa deal still shows high on the rumor charts.

The question is, who is Tampa willing to move?

In media interviews today, Lawton seemed determined that LeCavalier would remain in Tampa.

Lawton smiles too much when he talks for my liking. I think he’s bluffing.

So if he is moving LeCavalier, the Canadiens would have to give up a fair bit.

The initial speculated deal in January involved forwards Chris Higgins and Tomas Plekanec, prospect defenseman P.K. Subban and draft picks/prospects going to Tampa.

This scenario could still work with Higgins being a RFA. The prospect could be a goalie with Kari Ramo reportedly off to the KHL.

Subban would be likely substituted as he just signed with the Canadiens this spring.

The key to the deal between the two teams could be dependent on who the New York Islanders select first.

If New York goes with Victor Hedman, that’s how the deal could go.

With Tampa having the number two pick Friday, they can grab John Tavares to fill the void at forward and still have Martin St. Louis and the learning Steve Stamkos with a lower payroll for a couple years.

The alternate scenario could go a different way though.

Still provided that Hedman goes first, Tampa could give up their pick (Tavares) and a few others lesser players for Montreal’s 18th overall pick and a smaller package of players.

Maybe throwing Martin St. Louis into the mix will sweeten the Canadiens end of the pot, and help Tampa’s pocket book.

Montreal retains some cap room to announce that Saku Koivu (on the cheap), Alex Kovalev and, maybe, Mike Komisarek (depending on the Islanders choice) are re-signed.

If Tavares goes to the Islanders, we could see possible a deal along the latter of the two or a deal back to square one.

With a stash of centres in this years draft likely to go in the first round, both Montreal and the Lightning could still have a winner in the draft down the middle.

In all likelihood, we won’t know officially though until sometime early Friday evening when NHL commissioner Gary Bettman takes the stage to make any deal official.