The Montreal Canadiens and Tampa Bay Lightning will start the NHL playoffs in the eastern conference with Game 1 of their series and the first of the postseason on Wednesday night and the matchup on CNBC will be streaming online from Tampa Bay Times Forum as each team tries to start off the matchup with an advantage as they push towards the Stanley Cup.
Montreal comes into the game after finishing third in their division and they will visit Tampa after they finished second and that is the new way the playoffs have been formatted with the wild cards being added the divisions changed up. This series has potential to be one of the best in the NHL and the Canadiens come in after a win over the Rangers in overtime to finish the season and now Carey Price and company will look to make a strong push through the east. Ryan Callahan was traded to the Lightning during the season and he will be looking for a fast start.
The second game in the series comes on Friday night and that will be at 7 pm ET and the other series matchups in the east as the champion Boston Bruins as the number one seed and they play against the second wild card in the Red Wings. The Canadiens and Lightning are playing as the two and three teams in their division, while the Blue Jackets were the first wild card and they play against the Metro champs in the Pittsburgh Penguins. The last matchup in the east is a classic rivalry and it has the Philadelphia Flyers as the third finisher in the Metropolitan, while the New York Rangers will host the team in Game 1 as the number two team behind the Penguins.
The new playoffs format will be interesting to watch play out and it gives some teams a solid route to the conference finals. Montreal has been a strong team defensively this season and they are ranked eighth in the NHL in goals against and fourth in penalty kill percentage. The team is 19th in power play percentage and 21st in goals per game and they will need to score to beat the Lightning. Max Pacioretty led the team in scoring and goals this season and he will be looking to have a strong series against Tampa as well.
The Lightning come into things after finishing in the Atlantic division and while leading scorer Martin St. Louis is now in NY, the team has solid talent and should make for a tough challenge in the first round. The team ended the season with a win in a shootout against the Washington Capitals and they come in at ninth in the league in scoring and 11th in goals against, while they were in the top half in power play percentage and in the bottom half ranked in penalty kill percentage.
Check here for the Tampa Bay Lightning and Montreal Canadiens Live coverage from the NHL playoffs.
