Face-off: 1900 ET, 14/12/2021
Venue: PPG Paints Arena
Pittsburgh and Montreal shared a win apiece in last month’s two meetings but the Penguins now look in better shape for the series decider.
They head into this contest on a four-match hot streak, whereas the Canadiens are without a victory in any of their last six games.
With the visitors struggling to score, we like 2.05 for a home win and under 6.5 total goals in our Pittsburgh Penguins vs Montreal Canadiens predictions.
Pittsburgh Penguins Odds
Pittsburgh returned from three road wins to grind out a 1-0 triumph over Anaheim in front of their own fans at PPG Paints Arena.
Casey DeSmith made 33 saves to earn his first shutout of the season and Brock McGinn grabbed the crucial goal at the other end.
Head coach Mike Sullivan said: “If we’re going to win games consistently, we can’t just rely on scoring goals.
“We’ve got to keep it out of our net, we’ve got to play on both sides of the puck.
“We’ve got to learn how to play in those types of environments and I thought the guys did a good job.”
This should hopefully be a more decisive success, though, and 4.33 for the Penguins to prevail by three goals stands out from the NHL odds.
Montreal Canadiens Odds
Montreal have fallen to the foot of the Eastern Conference with just 15 points from 29 games, 18 behind Pittsburgh, who have played two less.
We cleaned up with a trio of successful selections when the Canadiens were beaten 4-1 by St Louis in their latest setback.
Alexander Romanov managed a consolation strike in the third period but there was no happy return to Enterprise Center for former Blues goalie Jake Allen.
Forward Joel Armia commented: “We came out pretty good in the third, had chances to get back in the game after we score the first one but it just didn’t go in.”
Unfortunately, that has been a familiar scenario of late for Montreal, who have been kept to one goal or less in four of their last six games.
Let’s add 10.5 for the visitors to go down 4-1 again here to our NHL predictions.
Additional stats
Last result:
PITTSBURGH 1-0 Anaheim
St Louis 4-1 MONTREAL
Head-to-head: Pittsburgh 3-6 Montreal, Montreal 0-6 Pittsburgh, Montreal 2-0 Pittsburgh, Montreal 4-3 Pittsburgh
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