What’s the story with Montreal?
Montreal has been scoring goals at a hot pace so far this season. Their 3.57 goals scored per game ranks eighth in the entire NHL so far.
Winger Joel Armia ranks first on the team with four goals so far, with Brendan Gallagher and Max Domi having three goals scored apiece. Five other players have scored two goals this season for Montreal, and five have scored one goal. That’s a nice distribution of goals up and down the lines for the Canadiens – creating an impressive scoring balance.
While none of the individual statistics for Montreal would rank their players near the top of the league in any major scoring categories, Montreal has benefited from scoring up and down the lineup, which has kept opposing teams off balance and having to scramble to defend at all times.
At the same time, Montreal ranks in the bottom half of the league in terms of goals allowed per game. They rank tied for 13th from the bottom of the league with the St. Louis Blues at 3.29 goals allowed per game.
Starting goaltender Carey Price has been pretty good in his six games, allowing 17 goals on 181 shots for a .906 save percentage and 2.79 goals against average. His backup Keith Kinkaid was very bad in his one appearance, allowing five goals on 39 shots for a .872 save percentage and 4.93 GAA.
Are there any edges?
Based on the per-game averages, the betting edge in Montreal Canadiens games thus far has been on the over total goals. On average, there have been 6.86 goals scored per game in their seven games.
The usual total goals set by bookmakers is 5.5 or 6, and Canadiens games would have tied or gone over that total in five of those seven games. The one thing to keep an eye out for, though, is that those were the first five games of the season. In Montreal’s last two games, there have been only four goals scored in each, which would result in the over being a losing bet.
What’s ahead for the team?
In the next week, Montreal will hit the road against St. Louis and then Minnesota this Saturday and Sunday, before coming back home to face San Jose and Toronto on Thursday and Saturday.
Montreal has already faced St. Louis (winning 6-3), Minnesota (winning 4-0) and Toronto (winning 6-5) so far this season. All those games were high scoring, and could be a good opportunity to bet over the total goals again.
If you want to get in on the action, check out one of the online sportsbooks below.