MONTREAL (AP) Carey Price made 18 saves for his first shutout of the season and Victor Mete and Nick Suzuki scored their first NHL goals in a first-period burst in the Montreal Canadiens’ 4-0 victory over the Minnesota Wild on Thursday night.
Joel Armia and Brendan Gallagher also scored and Nick Cousins had an assist in his Montreal debut to help the Canadiens improve to 3-2-2. The 32-year-old Price has 45 career shutouts.
Alex Stalock stopped 28 shots for the reeling Wild. They dropped to 1-6-0.
Playing his 127th NHL game, the 21-year-old Mete opened the scoring with 5:23 left in the first. He found space in the slot, took a backhand pass from Cousins from behind the net and beat Stalock to the glove side. That ended the longest goal drought to start a career in Canadiens history, a mark previously held by Mike Komisarek at 122 games.
Armia connected on a 5-on-3 power play with 2:28 left in the first. He leads Montreal with four goal.
Suzuki scored with 37 seconds remaining in the period. A whiffed shot from Jeff Petry landed right on Suzuki’s backhand before Stalock could cover the right post.
Gallagher put a fourth past Stalock at 12:40 of the third period.
NOTES: The Canadiens beat Minnesota for the first time since Nov. 8, 2014, snapping a streak of nine losses. … Mete and Suzuki are the first Canadiens to score their first NHL goals in the same game since 2005, when Chris Higgins and Alexander Perezhogin did it against the New York Rangers.
UP NEXT
Wild: Host Montreal on Sunday.
Canadiens: At St. Louis on Saturday.
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