Coyotes defeat Canadiens for sixth win in past seven games

MONTREAL --The Arizona Coyotes won for the sixth time in seven games, defeating the Montreal Canadiens 6-3 at Bell Centre on Tuesday.

Clayton Keller and Nick Schmaltz each extended a point streak to seven games, Lawson Crouse had a goal and an assist, and Karel Vejmelka made 36 saves for the Coyotes (20-36-4), who won back-to-back games after defeating the Ottawa Senators 5-3 on Monday.
Arizona scored four goals in the first period and ended a five-game road trip 4-1-0.
"I'm pleased with our guys' effort," Coyotes coach Andre Tourigny said. "The guys battled tonight. It's been a long trip. This is our second game in as many nights, our fifth game of the trip, we've been gone 10 days so it's time to go home and recover a bit."

Cole Caufield scored twice, and Joel Armia and Jeff Petry each had two assists for the Canadiens (16-36-8), who played without defenseman Ben Chiarot. Coach Martin St. Louis said before the game it was "management's decision."
"It was a bit sad to see him left aside but that's life, that's hockey," Montreal forward Paul Byron said. "We tried our best to win without him tonight."
Sam Montembeault allowed four goals on seven shots before being replaced at the start of the second period by Cayden Primeau who made 10 saves.
"I think we've played well the past three games," St. Louis said. "We deserved better tonight."
Keller put Arizona up 5-1 with a power-play goal at 17:49 of the second period.
Caufield made it 5-2 at 18:47 with a shot from the left circle and scored eight seconds later to cut Arizona's lead to 5-3.
St. Louis compared Caufield to Steven Stamkos, his former teammate with the Tampa Bay Lightning.
"He's a little like 'Stammer' when he was young, his shot," St. Louis said. "It's a shot that hides his shooting angle a bit and it's very accurate. I know [Stamkos is] bigger than Cole but in terms of his shot's dynamics, it's pretty close."

Keller set up Schmaltz's goal into an empty net at 15:42 of the third period for the 6-3 final.
"We really opened the door there and that was unfortunate, but I think we rebounded pretty well in the third," Coyotes defenseman Anton Stralman said. "We knew they were going to put a lot of pressure on and had the momentum of the game at that point. (Vejmelka) made some keys [saves] in the right times to keep us in early on. … I think we dropped a lot of games like that throughout the season, and tonight, except from a few shifts here and there, we had pretty good control.
Hayton gave the Coyotes a 1-0 lead at 1:57 of the first period when he scored five-hole on a delayed penalty.
Stralman made it 2-0 at 3:52, tapping in Riley Nash's backhand pass off a give-and-go.
Laurent Dauphin cut it to 2-1 at 13:38, scoring from the point on a shot that went off Stralman and Coyotes forward Matias Maccelli.
Nick Ritchie put the Coyotes up 3-1 at 18:34 and Crouse, who scored his first NHL hat trick Monday, extended the lead to 4-1 at 19:49 on a breakaway.
NOTES:Montreal forward Josh Anderson did not play because of a lower-body injury. … Schmaltz has 17 points (seven goals, 10 assists), and Keller has 14 points (five goals, nine assists) during seven-game point streaks. … Keller has 60 points (26 goals, 34 assists) in 60 games, and is the fastest player to reach 60 points in a season for Arizona since Shane Doan (58 games in 2007-08). … Caufield tied Maurice Richard (Dec. 28, 1944) for the third-fastest two goals by a Canadiens player. Peter Mahovlich holds the record at five seconds (Feb. 20, 1971) and Stephane Richer is second with two goals seven seconds apart (Nov. 30, 1987). … Caufield's goals were the fastest pair by an NHL player since Radek Faksa of the Dallas Stars scored twice, eight seconds apart, on Nov. 8, 2017.