Canadiens Will Need Depth to Score Against the Senators
Saturday night against the Ottawa Senators won’t be about highlight goals or star power. Brendan Gallagher said it plainly: games like this get tight, emotional, and physical—and that’s when the bottom six has to matter.
Gallagher didn’t sound angry in his comments. He sounded like someone who has lived through this exact stretch before and knows there’s no shortcut out of it. What he kept circling back to was depth. He wasn’t using it as a buzzword, but as a survival skill. When games tighten up, whistles go away, and rivalries take over, it’s no longer enough for the top six to look dangerous. If the bottom six fades into the background, the game slips away from you. Not all at once, but shift by shift.
Every Meeting Between Ottawa and Montréal Becomes Tense
The Canadiens know exactly what Ottawa brings. Every meeting turns into a grind. Hits add up. Tempers flare. The danger isn’t effort — it’s execution slipping when players chase the moment instead of playing through it. Gallagher hinted at that when he talked about using experience the right way. Emotional control doesn’t mean backing off. It means knowing where to direct it.
For Montréal, the path is pretty straightforward. The top players will draw attention, so the difference has to come from depth lines staying involved, getting pucks deep, winning shifts, and forcing Ottawa to defend for whole minutes. That work doesn’t always show up on the scoresheet right away, but it tilts the ice. It also keeps the game from unravelling emotionally, which matters in a rivalry like this.
Gallagher Was Frustrated with the Canadiens’ Previous Game
Gallagher also acknowledged frustration; you could hear it between the lines. The previous night didn’t sit well with him. That matters because he’s never been a player who shrugs off bad games. He stores them. He uses them. That’s where experience shows up — in knowing which moments to lean into and which ones to let pass. He wasn’t selling confidence for the sake of it. He was talking about a belief built from scars.
What stood out most was how often he used “we.” Not casually — deliberately. This wasn’t about his line or his role. It was about staying connected as a group. Bottom-six players staying engaged. Coaches and players aligned. Shifts that matter even if they don’t end in goals.
Rivalry games don’t wait for you to feel ready. They expose what you are. Gallagher’s message was clear: the Canadiens have learned enough lessons to know better. Now they have to prove it — together — on Saturday night.