In the Habs Room: Plekanec quick to share credit with Weise

DETROIT

Tomas Plekanec scored the breakthrough goal in the Canadiens’ 2-0 win over the Red Wings Monday night, but he was quick to share the credit with Dale Weise.

“That was (Weise’s) goal,” said Plekanec, who snapped a 0-0 tie with 2:30 remaining in regulation time. “I was jumping on the ice and I saw that he was controlling the puck on the boards and he managed to get the puck past the defencemen.”

The result was that Plekanec was alone in the middle of the ice with time to tee it up, especially since Pavel Datsyuk fell on the play.

“I knew I had time and I was able to get a good shot,” said Plekanec, who tucked the shot inside the post.

“I knew I got the pass to Pleky, but I didn’t see the play because I was going to the bench,” Weise said. “But I heard the reaction from the crowd.

The goal effectively put an end to a duel between the Red Wings’ Jimmy Howard and the Canadiens’ Carey Price, who made 25 saves for his fifth shutout of the season.

“It was a tight-checking game and we feel very comfortable in those games,” said P.K. Subban, who teamed with Andrei Markov to spark the defensive effort. “Those are the kind of games we don’t mind playing. We’ve had many games since I’ve been here when we’ve won in overtime or come back in the third and those are the kind of games you need to play to be successful in the post-season.”

“We talked about it after the second period,” noted Plekanec. “I thought we fought hard out there and we got better as the game went on.

The Canadiens are setting themselves up for the playoffs. As things stand now, they’ll face either Detroit or Boston in the first round and they are 4-0 against the Bruins and 3-0 against Detroit.

Subban played 28:10, had four shots on net and three blocked shots, while Markov was on the ice for 25:42 and also had four shots and three blocks. And Tom Gilbert returned after being a healthy scratch against Toronto and led the Canadiens with three hits and five blocked shots.

Max Pacioretty had an empty-net goal for his 26th of the season, but his greatest contribution may have come on defence as he hustled back to harass Luke Glendening on what started out as a clean breakaway. Pacioretty used his speed to catch the Detroit player and distracted him to the point where he was unable to get a shot off.

“That Detroit team played very well,” said Price. “They have a very good structure and, for the most part, we matched that tonight. You want to be playing games like this because these are the kind of games you’re going to be playing in the spring.

“I can’t say enough good things about the way Marky has been playing this year,” added Price. “He and Subby have been eating up a lot of quality minutes.”

It was Price’s fifth consecutive win and he improved his record to 32-11-2. He leads the NHL with a 1.93 goals-against average and a .935 save percentage.

phickey@montrealgazette.com

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