Coyotes

What would Allan Walsh have tweeted during the Montreal/Phoenix game?

Habs win 9th game of season when Client Jaroslav Halak wears his lucky Batman underwear… interesting…

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Interesting stat… 100% of Price’s wins have come when the Habs score goals…hmmm

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Teams have book on Price – miss the net and deflect puck off skate. Look for it – teams will keep taking advantage.

Far be it from me to tell Bob Gainey how to do his job.

But I swear to God, if the Canadiens general manager lets Tomas Plekanec go the way of Sheldon Souray and Mark Streit, I'm becoming a curling blogger.

Has Pleks, with a succession of linemates, played a bad shift since the season began?

Not that I can remember.

Three assists last night – and 200 points in his career.

Excellent on the power play and shorthanded.

9-7 on faceoffs, when the team was 24-33.

I know: Team policy is no negotiating during the season.

That policy was fine when there was no free agency, Bob. There were no player agents (any Tweets about Carey Price tonight, Walsh?), and the Canadiens' had Flying Frenchmen who flew for $25,000 a season.

Hockey has changed. Max Lapierre and Guillaume Latendresse are decidedly earthbound, and Pleks cannot be allowed to fly the coop.

Sign him, Bob.

Three to five years, for decent bread.

First win in the west.

Second win in regulation.

19th great game for Tomas Plekanec.

First things first: Andrei Kostitsyn.

Canadiens hold an optional practice this morning at the Bell Centre. Safe to predict AK46 won't be skating, but perhaps the Kremlin will deign to provide an update on his condition.

Looking at the replay, I think the damage was done when his head hit the glass. He certainly looked like he'd been concussed, and that's a tricky injury.

AK46 could be unavailable for a while, which will mean his brother joining Tomas Plekanec and Alex Kovalev. Christopher Higgins likely will play with Robert Lang and Tom Kostopoulos. 

I'm about to head down to the Bell Centre to watch the Habs take on Phoenix. I'm excited to see the 'Yotes play - they're a team loaded with young talent, they have a core of solid veterans, and a good (sometimes great) netminder. They remind me of the Habs a year or two ago. It'll be fun to see Wayner behind the bench and get a look at a team that normally gets little notice.

I'm afraid, however, that I might miss some of the action tonight because I'll be trying my best to look upwards and inwards, straining to see what's going on inside of Bob Gainey's mind.

Chris Higgins, Jaroslav Halak, and a draft pick for Marion Gaborik?

Guy Carbonneau reported Andrei Kostistyn was feeling a bit better after the game.

"He's still dizzy," Carbo said. "We'll know more when we do some tests tomorrow."

The coach would not classify the Kurt Sauer check that knocked Kostitsyn out as a dirty hit, but hastened to add "the league is trying to eliminate head shots, and that was a head shot."

Audio:

• Saku Koivu

• Guillaume Latendresse (starting with a Brian Wilde speech)

• Alex Tanguay in English  and in French

• Two hits of BGL, I and II

• Carbo in French

Our would-be Beasts of the East were not at their best in the west.

Canadiens were outshot in every game. They were outplayed for significant stretches –  usually the first 40 minutes – of every game.

They're lucky to be coming home with four points. And their next two games are against New Jersey and Ottawa.

Canadiens showed the effects of road fatigue last night.

Playing their third game in four nights, facing the defending Cup champs and surrendering a goal before the game was a minute old, the weary road warriors took a succession of lazy and undisciplined penalties. They killed them off – the PK went an astounding 8-for-8 – but the exertion of doing so took its toll.

Given the distortion of odd-man situations, we don't know how the team really measures up against Anaheim. We do know, however, that Canadiens were beaten badly by San Jose and eked out wins over Phoenix and Los Angeles.

Grand larceny in the desert:

Outplayed for most of the game, Canadiens score three unanswered goals to score an unlikely 4-2 win over a fast, aggressive Phoenix team.

Saku Koivu and Andrei Markov scored on power plays, then Sergei Kostitsyn completed a slick passing passing play with Christopher Higgins to put this one in the W column.

Canadiens had a mere 20 shots, while Carey Price faced a 39-shot bombardment and stopped 37 of them.

Coached by the great pacifist Wayne Gretzky, Coyotes spent the final seconds of the game gooning the Canadiens.

The win puts Canadiens in a tie with Pittsburgh, which lost, atop the Eastern Conference.

Bruins lost as well. And Ottawa is trailing in L.A.