Montreal waited all summer to return to the Bell Centre. The first team through the door is the one that ended its season.
The Canadiens’ home opener is not just another early October game. Carolina eliminated Montreal in last spring’s Eastern Conference Final, went on to win the Stanley Cup and now returns to the Bell Centre as the standard the Canadiens are still trying to reach.
The circumstances around the rematch have already changed. Montreal enters 1-0-1 after winning in Toronto and staging a four-goal comeback from a 5-1 deficit in Pittsburgh before losing 6-5 in overtime. Ivan Demidov, one of the young forwards expected to help push the Canadiens closer to Carolina’s level, is now out two to four weeks with a lower-body injury. Kaiden Guhle and Oliver Kapanen are also unavailable.
Carolina has its own problem. The defending champions are 1-1-1, were shut out on opening night, lost badly to Washington and needed overtime to collect their first win in Philadelphia. Seth Jarvis remains out following shoulder surgery. The Hurricanes are not arriving in Montreal looking invincible.
They are arriving with something more durable than invincibility: a structure that has survived enough roster changes and playoff rounds that three uneven games do not require it to be reinvented.
Carolina Finally Looked Like Carolina in Philadelphia
The Hurricanes’ opening week makes more sense if the Philadelphia game is treated as a return toward their normal process rather than simply their first victory.
Carolina outshot the Flyers 40-18 and repeatedly controlled where the game was being played. Sebastian Aho scored both regulation goals, Shayne Gostisbehere finished the game in overtime and the Hurricanes produced the kind of territorial pressure that has made them exhausting to play against for years.
That pressure matters more than the 1-1-1 record. Carolina’s system is designed to keep forcing a defense to make the next exit, win the next race and survive the next retrieval until eventually one of those plays fails. A team can defend the first forecheck correctly and still spend the shift under pressure because the Hurricanes recover the puck and begin again.
Montreal’s challenge is therefore not merely to match Carolina’s shot total. It is to prevent the Hurricanes from making each defensive shift contain several separate problems.
Demidov’s Absence Changes More Than One Line
Montreal can replace Demidov’s spot on the lineup card. Replacing what he gives the offense is more complicated.
The 20-year-old had already produced a goal and an assist in the first two games before suffering the lower-body injury that will keep him out for two to four weeks. Florian Xhekaj is expected to make his season debut Tuesday, while Montreal’s projected top six becomes Cole Caufield, Nick Suzuki and Chris Kreider above a Juraj Slafkovsky, Alex Newhook and Kirby Dach combination.
Those are still dangerous players. Suzuki already has four points, Caufield remains one of Montreal’s best finishers and Kreider adds exactly the kind of net-front threat that can punish a team when defensive coverage breaks down.
Demidov offered something different. He could create off the rush, manipulate defenders with the puck and turn a possession that appeared harmless into an entry with numbers. Against Carolina, losing a player capable of creating something before the Hurricanes’ defensive structure gets organized is particularly costly.
Montreal will have to manufacture more of that creation collectively rather than waiting for Demidov to destabilize a matchup himself.
The Bell Centre Can Give Montreal Energy. It Cannot Give Montreal Exits.
This will be Montreal’s first home game since Carolina ended its postseason on May 27, and the Bell Centre should sound like a playoff building long before puck drop. The Canadiens are openly treating the home opener as something significant, while the rematch gives the crowd an obvious emotional target.
That can help Montreal start fast. It can make a forecheck feel heavier, turn a routine save into momentum and amplify the first Carolina turnover. What it cannot do is solve the technical part of playing the Hurricanes.
Montreal has to move the puck cleanly out of its own zone. Carolina wants poor first passes, delayed decisions and defenders retrieving pucks while facing their own end boards. Every failed exit invites another layer of pressure, and eventually Aho, Andrei Svechnikov, Logan Stankoven or Nikolaj Ehlers receives the puck against a defensive group that has already been moving for 30 seconds.
Mike Matheson and Noah Dobson will carry much of that responsibility. Lane Hutson can move the puck as well as almost anyone on Montreal’s blue line, but Carolina is built to force puck-moving defensemen to defend first and create second.
The crowd can make the game louder. Montreal’s defense has to keep it from becoming longer.
Aho Is Already Driving the Part of Carolina That Works
Jarvis’ absence removes one of Carolina’s most energetic forwards and a player who contributes in almost every game state. The Hurricanes have compensated by moving William Carrier alongside Aho and Svechnikov, while distributing the rest of the attack across Stankoven, Taylor Hall, Jackson Blake, Ehlers and Jordan Staal.
Aho has been the central piece. His two goals against Philadelphia were part of a three-point night, and Carolina’s power play has already produced three of the team’s five goals this season. The overall offense has not exploded, but the Hurricanes are still creating a reliable scoring mechanism when they earn an extra skater.
That gives Montreal a fairly obvious rule for Tuesday: do not turn a difficult five-on-five matchup into unnecessary Carolina power plays. Early-season special-teams percentages will move dramatically from only a few opportunities, but Carolina does not need a large sample to make a bad penalty costly when Aho, Svechnikov, Ehlers and Gostisbehere are available.
The Canadiens need the game played through their best five-on-five players rather than handing Carolina an easier route to offense.
Dobeš Gets a Very Different Third Start
Jakub Dobeš has started both Montreal games and is projected to get the net again Tuesday. That continuity gives the Canadiens a goalie who has already lived through two radically different nights.
The opener in Toronto was controlled enough for Montreal to leave with a win. Pittsburgh became chaos. The Canadiens fell behind 5-1, stormed back to tie the game and eventually lost in overtime. Dobeš has therefore already played inside both a relatively structured game and one where almost nothing remained stable.
Carolina presents a third problem. The Hurricanes are less interested in trading rushes than in creating repeated possessions around the offensive zone. Dobeš may not face the kind of sudden end-to-end game Pittsburgh produced, but he could spend long stretches dealing with screens, tips, rebounds and shots arriving after his defense has failed to clear the zone twice.
His work after the first save becomes especially important. Carolina’s attack often becomes dangerous because the initial chance creates the next one.
Bussi Has More to Prove Than Carolina’s Defense
Brandon Bussi is expected to make his third start in four games for Carolina, giving Montreal perhaps the clearest part of the matchup it can attack.
Bussi’s opening-night loss was hardly a disaster. He stopped 19 of 20 shots against Florida, and Carolina’s inability to score did far more to determine that result. He also has the advantage of playing behind a defensive system that routinely reduces the amount of uncontrolled offense reaching its crease.
Still, Montreal does not need to treat him like a goalie who has already established years of dominance. The Canadiens should be willing to put pucks into difficult areas, create traffic and make Bussi handle rebounds while the Bell Centre remains engaged.
That does not mean firing from everywhere and calling the shot count offensive pressure. Montreal needs bodies between Bussi and the puck. Kreider is particularly valuable here because few forwards have spent more of their careers turning ordinary shots into difficult goaltending situations from the top of the crease.
If Montreal allows Carolina to keep the front of the net clean, Bussi’s night becomes significantly simpler.
Montreal’s Pittsburgh Comeback Is More Useful Than the Final Score
The Canadiens’ 6-5 overtime loss should not be remembered as Montreal blowing a four-goal lead. The opposite happened. Pittsburgh led 5-1 before Montreal scored four consecutive goals and forced overtime.
That comeback tells us something useful about this version of the Canadiens. They have enough skill to turn a game quickly, and they continued attacking instead of accepting that a four-goal deficit had settled the night. Suzuki drove much of the comeback and finished with four points.
What it does not establish is that Montreal can regularly survive the conditions that created the deficit. Carolina is less likely to give the Canadiens repeated open-ice opportunities once it gets ahead. The Hurricanes are comfortable possessing the puck, cycling below the dots and making a trailing opponent spend energy defending before it can begin chasing the score.
Montreal’s comeback ability makes Tuesday harder to put away. Avoiding the need for another comeback would be considerably more useful.
The Eastern Conference Final Still Hangs Over the Matchup
October games do not recreate May simply because the same teams are involved. The stakes are different, the lineups have changed and neither club should treat Tuesday like Game 6 of a playoff series that already ended.
The previous series still provides context because it showed Montreal exactly how difficult Carolina’s style becomes over repeated exposure. The Hurricanes kept forcing the same kinds of decisions until the Canadiens could no longer solve them often enough. Carolina eventually won the conference and the Stanley Cup, while Montreal entered the offseason knowing that merely reaching that stage was not the same as being ready to control it.
The home opener offers a small measurement of what has changed. Caufield, Suzuki, Slafkovsky, Hutson and the rest of Montreal’s young core get another look at the champions with a louder building and a new season around them.
They also get that look without Demidov and Guhle, which makes the comparison less forgiving than Montreal would have preferred.
Carolina Is Favored Because Its Problems Are Easier to Define
The Hurricanes are being treated as a modest road favorite, roughly -130 against Montreal around +110. That is a much more restrained number than the phrase “defending Stanley Cup champions against an injured young team” might suggest.
Part of that restraint comes from Carolina’s own start. The Hurricanes have scored only five goals in three games and have not consistently looked like the team that finished last season on top of the league. Jarvis remains missing, and Bussi is still establishing himself as part of Carolina’s new goaltending arrangement.
The difference is that Carolina’s solutions are easier to identify. Generate territorial pressure. Win retrievals. Keep feeding Aho and Svechnikov. Force Montreal to make repeated exits. Use the power play when the opportunity appears.
Montreal has to do more improvising. Demidov is suddenly gone from the lineup, Guhle remains unavailable and the Canadiens are reorganizing their forward groups on the morning of their home opener. The talent is there, but some of the connections have to be rebuilt in real time.
Montreal Can Make This Emotional. Carolina Can Make It Repetitive.
The Bell Centre should give Montreal exactly the opening it wants. A fast first ten minutes, one heavy forecheck and an early Caufield or Suzuki chance can make Tuesday feel much larger than the third game of the season.
Carolina’s advantage is that it does not have to answer emotion with emotion. The Hurricanes can make the game repetitive. Retrieve, exit, forecheck, recover, force another decision. Over 60 minutes, that repetition is what has separated Carolina from younger teams that can match its talent for shorter stretches.
Montreal is good enough to make the champions uncomfortable, especially at home. Without Demidov and Guhle, however, the Canadiens are being asked to solve one of the league’s most established structures with fewer of the players most capable of breaking structure themselves.
Prediction: Carolina Hurricanes 4, Montreal Canadiens 2. Montreal should create enough energy and offense to keep the home opener competitive, but Carolina’s pressure and depth give it more ways to control the game once the opening emotion settles. The Canadiens can make this look like May again for stretches. The Hurricanes remain better equipped to make those stretches end.
Sources
NHL, October 6, 2026 — Hurricanes-Canadiens projected lineups | Carolina Hurricanes, October 6, 2026 — Montreal game preview and projected lineup | Montreal Canadiens, October 6, 2026 — home-opener preview and morning-skate lineup | Montreal Canadiens, October 6, 2026 — Ivan Demidov injury update | NHL, September 14, 2026 — Carolina season preview