November 2, 2025
The Montreal Canadiens kicked off a 13-game November on Saturday night by greeting the Ottawa Senators at the Bell Centre. The result was a 4-3 overtime win.
Here’s what caught my eye.
Cole Caufield is a premium goal scorer.
Seven minutes into the game, Nick Suzuki delivered a beautiful pass to send Caufield in on a breakaway, and Cole got it by the tender for his 10th goal of the season.
Caufield sits atop the standings with Nathan MacKinnon, the first overall pick in 2013. How many teams regret their selection in 2019? The Habs do not, and they have collected a couple more guys from that draft along the way.
The Habs power play is clicking and Slaf is clicking with it.
Swapping out Demidov for Bolduc on that top wave did more than add a top-notch playmaker and left shot. It also freed up the bumper for Juraj Slafkovsky and he is making the coach feel good about the choice.
That was one beautiful goal from the bumper last night, finishing off some high-skilled passing like we have not seen in years. Slaf now has six goals in 12 games, with an assist on the books and another dozen off the books. He’s growing into the player HuGo had in mind when they drafted him.
Struble showed what he can do with his knuckles.
Jayden Struble has been busy trying to demonstrate he belongs in this line-up for the long haul, and on Saturday night he added his fists to the mix. In the process he sent Nick Cousins a strong message – this is not the team you left.
The Canadiens are far more skilled than they were in the days when Claude Julien was playing Cousins like he was Mario Lemieux… because he had few other options. But they’re also more committed to standing up for each other and they won’t be bullied.
A few games may have passed since Cousins tried to bully Demidov, but Struble has a long memory and he paid one back last night. Good to see Joe Veleno get in on that as well.
Ivan Demidov is a gamer.
It didn’t take long for the kid to hit his stride and make a difference. Just ask Sam Montembeault who has two games in the win column because Demidov scored late to tie a game they were then able to win in overtime.
Alex Newhook is having a breakout start to the season and has looked good with Demidov. Oliver Kapanen has also been good on that line, but I confess I do wonder how Demidov and Newhook would look with a proven 2C between them. We might find out before this season is done.
Kids, the Habs are 9-3 to start the season. Who had that on their bingo card?
Hab At Her 