Montreal Canadiens-Toronto Maple Leafs Game Preview

Montreal Canadiens-Toronto Maple Leafs game preview

The Montreal Canadiens will face the Toronto Maple Leafs at the Bell Centre tonight to begin their 2022-23 NHL season.

It is the first time since 2013 that the Canadiens will host the opening game against Toronto, and there will be plenty of new faces in the lineup. Juraj Slafkovsky, Arber Xhekaj, and Kaiden Guhle will make their NHL debuts.

Here is tonight’s projected lineup for the game against the Leafs.

22 – Cole Caufield	14 – Nick Suzuki	17 – Josh Anderson
91 – Sean Monahan	77 – Kirby Dach	68 – Mike Hoffman
20 – Juraj Slafkovsky	28 – Christian Dvorak	11 – Brendan Gallagher
32 – Rem Pitlick	71 – Jake Evans	63 – Evgenii Dadonov
LD	RD	G
21 – Kaiden Guhle	58 – David Savard	34 – Jake Allen
54 – Jordan Harris	26 – Johnathan Kovacevic	35 – Sam Montembeault
72 – Arber Xhekaj	6 – Chris Wideman

Michael Pezzetta and Jonathan Drouin skated this morning as the two extra skaters and will be healthy scratches.

Habs general manager Kent Hughes met the Montreal media this morning and gave an update on the injured players.

Mike Matheson, who was acquired in the off-season in the deal for Jeff Petry, underwent an MRI on Wednesday to determine the severity of his lower-body injury, and his results are expected in the next 48 hours.

Joel Edmundson, who is suffering from a lower back injury, is progressing well and has been skating with the team medical team for the past week. Paul Byron was placed on long-term injury reserve as he continues to deal with a hip injury.

” In the short term and probably even in the mid-term, it doesn’t look like Paul will be able to return, and he is still having trouble,” said Hughes. Carey Price is scheduled to address the media next week in regard to his health situation.

Jake Allen is scheduled to get the start in goal tonight against the Leafs in a season where he is now the de facto number-one goaltender.

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