3 Things to Watch: Sabres at Canadiens, Game 6 of Eastern 2nd Round

(1A) Buffalo Sabres at (3A) Montreal Canadiens

Eastern Conference Second Round, Game 6

Montreal leads best-of-7 series 3-2

8 p.m. ET; CBC, TVAS, SN, ABC

MONTREAL -- The Montreal Canadiens can reach the third round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs for just the second time in more than a decade with a victory against the Buffalo Sabres at Bell Centre on Saturday.

The Canadiens will be looking to advance to face the Carolina Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference Final.

Montreal last made it this far in the 2021 postseason when they defeated the Vegas Golden Knights in six games in the Stanley Cup semifinals. Because of concerns related to the COVID-19 pandemic, the playoff system was changed and fan capacity for games at Bell Centre were limited.

The previous time the Canadiens reached the Eastern Conference Final with full houses for home games was in 2014 when they faced the New York Rangers, a series New York won in six games.

Now Montreal has a chance to return there in this, their first Saturday night home game of the 2026 playoffs, in a building that will be raucous, to say the least.

“I think we just can’t get too high when good things are happening,” defenseman Lane Hutson said. “You kind of have to flush it out and use that energy and excitement, but remain level-headed.

“You can’t have that high and low thing. You’ve just got to play.”

Hutson has a point; despite the incredible atmosphere the Canadiens have enjoyed this spring, they are just 2-3 on home ice in these playoffs. 

Montreal has been in this position before; it was up 3-2 in the first round against the Tampa Bay Lightning with a Game 6 at home and ended up losing 1-0 in overtime despite playing what coach Martin St. Louis said may have been “our best game of the series.”

Conversely, the Sabres, who will try to extend the series to a Game 7 in Buffalo on Monday, have been road warriors in the postseason, losing only once thus far away from KeyBank Center.

“We just need to play our game,” Buffalo coach Lindy Ruff said. “We’ve played better on the road than we have at home. We’re 4-1 on the road. A lot of confidence in our group.”

Here are three things to watch in Game 6:

1. Trading spaces?

Over and over, Ruff has stuck close to a season-long rotation in net. Which means it wouldn’t be surprising to see the Sabres start Alex Lyon in goal for Game 6.

But if he is making that change -- or any other -- Ruff wasn’t biting Saturday morning.

When asked who would be starting in net, he laughed.

“You know what my answer is?” he said. “It’s one of the top three we have.”

Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen started the playoffs in net for the Sabres, but was replaced in the third period of Game 2 against the Boston Bruins in the opening round. Lyon held the net through the end of that series and was the starter as the second round opened. Buffalo opted to go with Luukkonen in Game 4, a 3-2 win, and Game 5, but Lyon entered that game in the third period of an eventual 6-3 loss.

And that’s not the only change that could be made.

“When you have a game like this, you’ve got to be willing to make any change you need, whether it’s D changes, line changes,” Ruff said. “I have to have a sense of what’s going good and what can make us better.

“I can just say right now that inside the game, if we’re not generating or we’re giving up too much, I think you automatically got to look at changes. We’ve sat for a day and a half talking about a Plan A and a Plan B. I think you have to have that in your pocket the whole time.”

2. Mr. Saturday Night

The stage is set for Canadiens forward Cole Caufield to live up to his nickname, which he has come by honestly.

Consider this: Caufield had 35 points (21 goals, 14 assists) in 23 Saturday night games during the regular season, part of his team-leading 88 points (51 goals, 37 assists) in 81 games.

Now, with Montreal playing its first Saturday home game of the 2026 postseason, he has the chance to shine again.

“It’s not a bad nickname,” he laughed. “I don’t really mind it. I’ve just got to live up to the name, I guess.”

St. Louis, for one, hopes he does.

“We don’t hate that,” St. Louis said with a chuckle. “You know, he loves the game and the energy of a Saturday night at the Bell Centre. 

“Does it raise his love of the game? I don’t know. For whatever reason he finds himself in great situations on Saturday nights.

“It’s fun to watch.”

3. To repeat: Montreal’s slow starts

It’s been a recurring theme for the Canadiens in this series: 

Poor starts to games. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

In Game 1, Buffalo forward Josh Doan scored 4:31 into the game. In Game 3, Sabres center Tage Thompson needed just 53 seconds after the opening face-off to put his team ahead. In Game 4, defenseman Mattias Samuelsson opened the scoring for Buffalo at 6:32 of the first period. And, most recently, it was forward Jason Zucker who scored just 120 seconds into the game to give Buffalo a 1-0 lead in Game 4.

Stop if you’ve heard this before.

Canadiens defenseman Alexandre Carrier certainly has.

“I mean, we always want to start strong but sometimes you have to give credit to the other team,” he said. “I thought the other night their building was super loud and they were flying. 

“It’s the type of start we ourselves want to have in Montreal.”

From the Sabres standpoint, Ruff hopes his team continues to push the pace from the beginning.

“I think early on part of our mentality has been, especially offensively, is getting pucks to the net,” he said. “And we’ve been getting rewarded. I think we’ve just got to kind of stay with that, put a full 60 minutes in.”

Sabres projected lineup

Peyton Krebs -- Tage Thompson -- Alex Tuch

Zach Benson -- Josh Norris -- Josh Doan

Jason Zucker -- Konsta Helenius -- Jack Quinn

Jordan Greenway -- Ryan McLeod -- Beck Malenstyn

Rasmus Dahlin -- Mattias Samuelsson

Bowen Byram -- Owen Power

Logan Stanley -- Conor Timmins

Alex Lyon

Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen

Scratched: Luke Schenn, Sam Carrick, Tyson Kozak, Josh Dunne, Colten Ellis, Michael Kesselring, Tanner Pearson

Injured: Noah Ostlund (lower body), Jiri Kulich (blood clot), Justin Danforth (lower body)

Canadiens projected lineup

Cole Caufield -- Nick Suzuki -- Juraj Slafkovsky

Alex Newhook -- Jake Evans -- Ivan Demidov

Alexandre Texier -- Phillip Danault -- Josh Anderson

Zachary Bolduc -- Joe Veleno -- Kirby Dach

Mike Matheson -- Alexandre Carrier

Lane Hutson -- Noah Dobson

Kaiden Guhle -- Arber Xhekaj

Jakub Dobes

Jacob Fowler

Scratched: Brendan Gallagher, Jayden Struble, Oliver Kapanen, Samuel Montembeault

Injured: Patrik Laine (lower body)

Status report

All three Sabres goalies skated with the spares; Lyon worked out in the starting goalie’s end and was first off the ice. … Stanley did not skate but could enter the lineup after being scratched the past two games; Schenn, a defenseman who played the past two games, was on the ice with defenseman Kesselring and forwards Carrick, Dunne, Kozak and Pearson. … Anderson, Dach, Texier and Newhook were not on the ice for the Canadiens morning skate, but Montreal is expected to dress the same lineup for the sixth straight game.

NHL.com senior writer Amalie Benjamin and independent correspondent Sean Farrell contributed to this report