Canadiens defeat Penguins in OT, win Game 1 of Cup Qualifiers

Jeff Petry scored with 6:03 remaining in overtime to give the Montreal Canadiens a 3-2 win against the Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Qualifiers at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto on Saturday.

Petry gathered the puck in the right face-off circle before taking a wrist shot to the blocker side to end the second NHL postseason game to include two penalty shots.

"It's something that we've talked about, the D to follow up the play, to support the attack offensively," the defenseman said. "I just saw the puck kind of pop out. I had my opportunity to jump there. I was going to walk into a shot, but they kind of closed it off so I took the extra second to pull it in and get the shot off."

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Carey Price made 39 saves, and Jesperi Kotkaniemi and Nick Suzuki scored for the Canadiens, the No. 12 seed in the Eastern Conference.

Sidney Crosby and Bryan Rust scored, and Matt Murray made 32 saves for the Penguins, the No. 5 seed. Pittsburgh has lost its past seven postseason games, last winning Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Second Round against the Washington Capitals in 2018.

"You never like to lose Game 1," Rust said. "There's obviously lessons to be learned. At the end of the day, it's a marathon, not a sprint. I think as long as our team comes back tomorrow, tries to learn some lessons and keep getting better from game to game, I think that's just going to give us the best chance to win."

Game 2 of the best-of-5 series is in Toronto, the Eastern Conference hub city, on Monday (8 p.m. ET; NBCSN, SN, TVAS, ATTSN-PT). The series winner will advance to the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

There hasn't been a best-of-5 series in the NHL since 1986. The League used them for the preliminary round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs from 1980-86, and the team that won Game 1 went on to win the series 87.5 percent of the time (49 of 56).

Kotkaniemi put the Canadiens ahead 1-0 at 11:27 of the first period. Paul Byron deflected a shot from Brett Kulak off of Kotkaniemi as Penguins defenseman Jack Johnson hit him near the crease for his first NHL postseason goal.

Suzuki also scored his first NHL postseason goal when the rookie forward made it 2-0 at 6:53 on a wrist shot from the left face-off circle.

"It's a definitely a different setting," Suzuki said. "Just having that first game to kind of see what it's all about. But coming into this game, I think that we had a lot of confidence and a good jump off the start."

Crosby banked a shot in off Price's skate, cutting it to 2-1 at 9:55 of the second, before Rust tied it 2-2 with a power-play goal at 12:34. A shot from Jared McCann went off Penguins forward Patric Hornqvist in front of the crease, leaving the puck for Rust to score on a wrist shot.

"Guys did a really good job of not panicking," Murray said. "Sticking to the game plan. Getting back into the game."

Pittsburgh, which was 1-for-7 on the power play, did not score on a 5-on-3 that lasted 1:32 after Ben Chiarot was called for high-sticking Crosby 58 seconds into the third period.

"We understand that the power play has to be better," Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said. "Obviously, it had the opportunity to be the difference tonight. It wasn't. We'll go back to work tomorrow."

Pittsburgh forward Conor Sheary missed wide left on a penalty shot with 3:03 remaining in the third.

Montreal forward Jonathan Drouin missed a penalty shot on a backhand at 6:46 of overtime.

There were three penalty shots March 29, 1923, when Cy Denneny and Punch Broadbent of the Ottawa Senators, and Duke Keats of the Edmonton Eskimos each failed to score in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final. Ottawa won 2-1 in overtime.

After being outshot 18-6 in the first period, the Canadiens outshot the Penguins 29-23 the rest of the game.

"Carey was huge throughout that whole first period and gave us a chance to come back and kind of adjust ourselves there for the second," Montreal coach Claude Julien said. "But he made some big saves throughout the whole game. The first period is where he allowed us to stay in the game and gave us a chance to win this."

NOTE: Drouin's attempt was the first overtime penalty shot in a postseason game since Aleksander Barkov had one for the Florida Panthers in a 2-1 loss to the New York Islanders on April 22, 2016. Including Barkov's, there were three overtime penalty shots in NHL postseason history entering Saturday. Joe Juneau had one in the second overtime for the Washington Capitals in a 3-2 loss to the Penguins on April 24, 1996; Aleksey Morozov had one for Pittsburgh in a 3-2 loss to Montreal on April 23, 1998. None of them scored.

NHL.com columnist Dave Stubbs contributed to this report