One may have been hard pressed to guess which team was still fighting for a playoff spot and which was long out of the picture on Saturday night in Edmonton.
Nick Suzuki had a goal and two assists as the Montreal Canadiens remained hot of late, defeating the Edmonton Oilers 5-2.
Brendan Gallagher and Cole Caufield each had a goal and an assist. Artturi Lehkonen and Mike Hoffman also scored for the Canadiens (15-34-7), who have won seven of their last eight games despite still sitting near the bottom of the NHL standings.
Chris Wideman chipped in two assists and goalie Sam Montembeault made 28 saves to give interim head coach Martin St. Louis a 7-4 record.
“We feel pretty confident the way we’re playing, we’re just having fun, we’re playing a certain style that we all enjoy,” Gallagher said. “He [St. Louis] seems to be bringing the best out of a lot of us and we’re just having fun playing the game right now, it’s good to see in our group.”
WATCH | Habs roll past Oilers:
Montreal played another solid game Saturday night defeating Edmonton 5-2, pushing Habs record to 7-1 under new head coach Martin St. Louis. 0:51
Evander Kane and Ryan McLeod replied for the Oilers (30-22-4), who have dropped two straight while in the middle of a heated playoff race. Mike Smith stopped 24 shots.
“It wasn’t our best effort, not the best I’ve seen in my three weeks here,” said Oilers head coach Jay Woodcroft, who sports a 7-4-1 record since replacing Dave Tippett. “We can do better. We can execute at a higher rate than we did tonight.
Montreal started the scoring 11 minutes in when Caufield capitalized on an odd-man rush, sending a wrist shot past Smith for his eighth of the season. It was the 37th time in the last 47 games that Edmonton has allowed the game’s first goal.
However, the Oilers erased that lead just 22 seconds later as Leon Draisaitl made a great feed to Kane in front and he spun around and beat Montembeault for his eighth goal in 17 games since signing with Edmonton, and third in his last two games.
Montreal surged back ahead with 39 seconds left in the opening period as Gallagher ended an 18-game goalless drought by scoring on a power play rebound opportunity.
Edmonton knotted the game back up five minutes into the middle frame as McLeod tucked in a rebound from a tough angle. The goal survived a review as Montreal argued that Zach Hyman had interfered with Montembeault on the play.
Suzuki puts Montreal on top for good
The Habs then had a goal of their own by Suzuki called back due to an offside call, but then Suzuki scored again on the same power play, his 13th, to make it 3-2.
Montreal had what would have been a short-handed goal by Laurent Dauphin called back with seven minutes left in the second period on yet another offside call.
The Canadiens extended their lead with a short-handed goal midway through the third as Kulak turned Smith inside out before getting it in front to Lehkonen to deposit into a wide-open net.
Hoffman scored an empty-net goal for Montreal with less than four minutes left.
The Oilers are back in action on Monday for a short one-game trip to Calgary, while the Canadiens are off until Wednesday, when they are in Vancouver to face the Canucks.
Habs forward Mathieu Perreault played in his 700th career NHL game.