Canadiens end Blue Jackets win streak

MONTREAL -- Carey Price made 37 saves, and the Montreal Canadiens ended the Columbus Blue Jackets' six-game winning streak with a 3-1 victory at Bell Centre on Monday.
Price has won consecutive games for the first time in 13 starts; he ended Montreal's five-game losing streak (0-3-2) when he made 36 saves in a 3-0 victory against the Buffalo Sabres on Saturday after missing 10 games because of a lower-body injury.

Brendan Gallagher and Jonathan Drouin scored in the first period for the Canadiens (10-12-3). Andrew Shaw scored an empty-net goal at 18:36 of the third period.
WATCH: [All Blue Jackets vs. Canadiens highlights]
"It might have been the two best goalies in the world going head to head tonight, and when you're able to get a two-goal lead it's tough to score on [Price]," Gallagher said.
Pierre-Luc Dubois scored, and Sergei Bobrovsky made 25 saves in his eighth straight start for Columbus (15-8-1), which went 0-for-5 on the power play.
"Being able to get five (penalty) kills tonight was huge for us," Price said.

The Blue Jackets have six power-play goals in 67 opportunities, the lowest success rate in the NHL (8.9 percent).
"We had 10 chances on the power play, didn't score," Columbus coach John Tortorella said. "I am tired of dissecting our power play. We had 10 chances on the power play.
"Tonight's problem was we didn't finish. We developed a lot of scoring chances on it. This is my last night that I'm speaking on the power play because I'm tired of talking about it. Yeah, I'll leave it at that."
Gallagher made it 1-0 at 3:11 of the first period. He drove the right side and scored unassisted with a wrist shot from the right face-off circle. Gallagher leads the Canadiens with nine goals.
Drouin scored his first power-play goal, his first goal of any kind in nine games, to make it 2-0 on a slap shot from the left face-off circle at 8:10.
The goals came on Montreal's first two shots.
"That was big for us," Gallagher said. "You look at how this team's been having success, the biggest part of it has probably been [Bobrovsky], and for us to get a couple by him early, we knew it wasn't going to be easy and the rest of the way he made some pretty big saves as well. You know we got a couple by him, we were able to defend as good as we could, and obviously Price was back there to make a couple of saves when we needed it."

After being outshot 11-6 in the first period, Columbus held an 18-7 advantage in the second, and Dubois scored his fourth goal at 16:08 to make it 2-1.
The Blue Jackets outshot Montreal 14-10 in the third, and 38-28 in the game.
"They're a good hockey team," Price said. "They played two really good periods against us."

Goal of the game

Gallagher's goal at 3:11 of the first period.

Save of the game

Price's save on Boone Jenner's power-play opportunity at 8:41 of the second period.

Highlight of the game

Drouin's power-play goal at 8:10 of the first period.

They said it

"We played a 40-minute hockey game, and you can't do that. It's just a lousy first goal. You don't see that very often with [Bobrovsky]. I was hoping our team could pick up [Bobrovsky]. The first period, we just didn't compete. After that, I thought we played a good 40 minutes, but we don't find a way to beat Price and they win the game." -- Blue Jackets coach John Tortorella
"I thought he made some big saves at opportune times, and that's what goaltenders do when they're at the top of their game. They give everybody else confidence. So, he's been an outstanding goaltender for us the last two games and he's given us a chance to win, so we're happy to have him back and have him back in top form." -- Canadiens coach Claude Julien on goalie Carey Price

Need to know

The Blue Jackets were 7-0-1 in their previous eight games against Atlantic Division teams, including a 2-1 overtime win in Montreal on Nov. 14. ... Gallagher's goal was his 200th NHL point.

What's next

Blue Jackets: Host the Carolina Hurricanes on Tuesday (7 p.m. ET, FS-O, FS-CR, NHL.TV)
Canadiens: Host the Ottawa Senators on Wednesday (7:30 p.m. ET, SN, RDS, NHL.TV)