Predators vs. Canadiens: Ryan O'Reilly's Late Power-Play Tip Completes Nashville's Rally From Two Goals Down

The Bell Centre was loud, the Canadiens were buzzing, and for roughly half of Thursday night Montreal looked like the better hockey team. Then Nashville did the most veteran thing imaginable: it stayed patient, waited for one mistake, and let Ryan O'Reilly do Ryan O'Reilly things in front of the net.

O'Reilly redirected a Roman Josi point shot on the power play with 3:16 left in regulation, Adam Edstrom piled on with two empty-net goals, and the Nashville Predators rallied from a 2-0 deficit to beat the Montreal Canadiens 5-2. Five straight goals, one tidy comeback, and a Montreal crowd that went home wondering how a game it controlled for so long got away.

Two Goals Down, Then the Tide Turned

Montreal thought it had the opening goal just 1:36 into the game when Chris Kreider buried a rebound from in tight on Juuse Saros, but Nashville challenged for offside and won. The first period ended 0-0, which in hindsight was the first sign that the hockey gods had a sense of humor.

The Canadiens broke through at 3:12 of the second with the teams playing 4-on-4. Nick Suzuki won the race to a loose puck in a scramble and squeezed a backhand five-hole for his third goal in four games. At 8:50, Josh Anderson's forecheck forced Adam Wilsby into a turnover behind the Nashville net, and Anderson fed Alex Newhook, who flipped one over Saros' glove for a 2-0 lead.

Montreal was rolling. Then the Predators found a pulse.

At 15:06, Alexander Kerfoot got a stick on Wilsby's point shot in front and redirected it past Jacob Fowler for his first goal as a Predator. Ross Colton picked up the secondary assist, his first point with Nashville. With 32 seconds left in the period and Noah Dobson in the box for tripping Filip Forsberg, Matthew Wood found a loose puck in a crease pileup and jammed it home for a 2-2 tie. The net had been knocked loose when Anderson drove Steven Stamkos into the post, but the goal survived a video review. Anderson was also tagged for cross-checking Stamkos, and Arber Xhekaj was handed a misconduct at the same time.

"The puck was loose and somehow it just came right to me," Wood said.

The Veterans Run the Show

O'Reilly logged 23:04, and his winner was a textbook piece of net-front craft. Mike Matheson had just been sent off for tripping Stamkos at 15:45, and 59 seconds into the advantage Josi wound up from the blue line while O'Reilly, parked in the slot, deflected the one-timer past Fowler's glove.

He was candid afterward about how ugly parts of the night looked.

"We stuck with it, everyone was working, it wasn't pretty at times but we found a way to win," O'Reilly said. "And that's a huge two points for us."

Josi was the quiet hammer from the blue line, setting up both O'Reilly's winner and Edstrom's second empty-netter while playing 27:49. NHL.com noted he now has five points (one goal, four assists) and became the third defenseman in franchise history with a season-opening point streak of at least four games, joining Marek Zidlicky (six games in 2003-04) and Dan Hamhuis (five in 2007-08).

Stamkos added two assists and drew three Montreal penalties, including the Matheson trip that set up the winner. Per NHL.com, he has six points during a four-game point streak.

Then there was Saros, who made 31 saves on 33 shots and kept the Predators alive through a second period that Montreal largely owned. O'Reilly gave him the credit.

"If it wasn't for Juuse that could have got out of hand," O'Reilly said.

Turning Point: One Breakaway, Two Different Endings

At 11:13 of the third, with the game tied 2-2, Anderson broke in alone on Saros. The Nashville goalie flashed out his left pad and kept it even. About four and a half minutes later, Matheson went to the box, and Nashville's power play needed less than a minute to make Montreal pay.

That is the margin in October hockey. One team buries its breakaway chance, the other buries its power play, and only one of them goes home happy.

"It's frustrating any time you can almost close out the game there and the game's on your hands and you're going down on a breakaway," Anderson said. "Obviously you want to bury it, and it's one that I'm still thinking about."

Edstrom then iced it with empty-net goals at 17:23 and 18:34. The first was his first goal as a Predator, and the second gave him a two-goal night in 10:19 of ice time.

Stats That Matter

• 33-20: Shots on goal, Montreal over Nashville. The Canadiens dominated the volume and lost by three.
• 2-for-5: Nashville's power play, which scored the tying and winning goals. Montreal went 0-for-3.
• 31 saves: Saros' total, and he needed nearly all of them.
• 7 points: Suzuki's total through four games. NHL.com says that is the most by a Montreal skater through the team's first four games since Alex Galchenyuk also had seven in 2013-14.
• 5 straight: Nashville goals after falling behind 2-0.

What It Means

Nashville moves to 2-1-1 and 1-0-1 on the road, bouncing back from Tuesday's 5-4 overtime loss in Toronto. The win came at a cost: NHL.com reported the Predators finished with 11 forwards and five defensemen after Mavrik Bourque and William Trudeau each sustained an upper-body injury. O'Reilly also admitted his team still has two personalities.

"Right now we're two different teams," O'Reilly said.

The Predators visit Ottawa on Saturday.

Montreal falls to 1-2-1 and is winless in its last three, with both home games ending in regulation losses. Fowler, the 21-year-old recalled from Laval of the AHL on Wednesday, made 15 saves on 18 shots in his season debut and deserved better. Suzuki was blunt about how the night felt.

"I thought we outplayed them the majority of the game," Suzuki said. "We just didn't score on our chances. Obviously the score is what it is."

Fowler felt the same way. "I thought we were playing a good game," he said, before adding that it "(stinks) to give up that one late."

The Canadiens host Detroit on Saturday.

Closing Take

Montreal played the better hockey for long stretches, and that is exactly what will sting. Nashville showed the kind of quiet professionalism that wins in April, never panicking down two goals in a loud building and cashing in when the door finally cracked open. Wood summed up the locker room mood in one line: "We have no quit in this group." On this night, the scoreboard backed him up.

Stats from the official box score via ESPN. Game details from the Associated Press and NHL.com; postgame quotes as reported by NHL.com.