April 16th, 2025, 10:41pm
MONTREAL – Kaiden Guhle scored twice, and the Montreal Canadiens closed their final Eastern Conference playoff spot with a 4-2 victory over the Carolina Hurricanes on Wednesday night in the regular season finale.
The Canadians needed at least points to remove Columbus from the playoff contest. They face the Metropolitan Division and the Washington Capitals, the first seed of the conference, in the first round.
“We don’t just roll over against each other against the first species, so we believe we’re excited about the opportunity,” said Nick Suzuki Center, who finished the season with a career-high 89 points, with Pierre Turgeon, the Canadians, the most in 1995-96.
Suzuki also scored 30th goal and assisted him in the second half of the second season. Jake Evans had an empty net goal, and Sam Montenby made 27 saves, with Montreal finishing 40-31-11, reaching the playoffs for the first time since 2021.
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Wednesday’s victory concluded a surprising shift for the Canadians, following in their overall rankings at 8-13-3 on December 1st. Montreal has finished eighth in the Atlantic Division each in the past three seasons.
“It wasn’t a year, so it wasn’t just one team, so I’m just proud. This is three or four years, and it’s really going to grind together,” Forward Brendan Gallagher said. “We’re so happy for these people that this city will experience playoff time.”
Taylor Hall and Tyson Jost scored for Carolina, while Peter Kochetkov stopped 17 shots. Strained in the playoffs, Carolina put some key players down. The Hurricanes will face New Jersey in the first round.
Montreal missed the opportunity to round out the playoff spots with three previous games. The Canadiens worked overtime in Toronto and fell into a shootout against Chicago after losing controls to Ottawa.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
