Lars Eller scores twice as Penguins wrap up first road trip with a comeback win in Montreal

Matt Vensel / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

MONTREAL — All things considered, this was a pretty satisfying first road trip.

The Penguins hit the road immediately after their ugly home opener and took two of three against a trio of Atlantic Division teams with legit playoff aspirations.

Sure, there are still concerns about their goaltending situation and a lack of scoring opportunities during the season’s first week. But the Penguins headed back to the ‘Burgh with confidence after beating the Montreal Canadiens, 6-3, on Monday.

“They’re a good young team. They’re fast. They’re explosive. And they’re a very capable group,” Mike Sullivan said. “We beat a real good Detroit team. I thought we were right in it in Toronto. It’s not perfect. We’ve got a ways to go as far as building our overall game. But there’s a lot to like about what’s going on out there.”

This was a gutsy win at Bell Centre. The Penguins had another excellent opening period but coughed up a 2-0 lead. They stuck with it and rallied back, thanks in part to an awesome goal from Lars Eller. Newcomer Kevin Hayes got the winner.

He put them up, 4-3, with 12:13 remaining in the third period. Parked in front, the big forward corralled a rebound and tucked the puck behind Sam Montembeault.

“One of the things we talked about between periods was just sometimes a simple play, putting the puck on net when we have people down there, is a very effective way to manufacture offense,” Sullivan said. “Hayes’ goal is a perfect example.”

Kris Letang added an insurance goal in his hometown to keep the good vibes going.

Actually, make that “Good Vibrations,” the team’s new victory song this season.

The Penguins couldn’t have asked for a much better start. It was even better than the one they had two nights earlier in their 4-2 loss in Toronto. They fired the first eight shots and gave Tristan Jarry a 2-0 cushion. The crowd roared when the home team finally recorded a shot on goal with 6:31 remaining in the first period.

“We played really well in the first period. They didn’t have a sniff,” Letang said.

Eller and Rickard Rakell got the goals for the Penguins, beating Montembeault.

Eller’s came off the rush. Jesse Puljujarvi pulled up and found the trailing Eller, and the former Canadiens center whipped a perfect shot past Montembeault’s glove.

The Penguins then went to work down low to set up Rakell for his second goal in as many games. They ranked just 30th in the NHL in scoring chances off the cycle entering the night, per Sportlogiq. But Evgeni Malkin made a sweet centering pass from below the goal line to Rakell, who dropped to one knee to finish that off.

The Canadiens came to life late in the first. Jarry had to make a couple of difficult saves before defenseman Kaiden Guhle scored on a one-timer from the wall.

Montreal carried that momentum into the second period and tied it up, 2-2, with Ryan Graves in the box. On that power-play goal, Letang chased a check into the corner and couldn’t recover in time to prevent a tap-in tally for Juraj Slafkovsky.

The game soon opened up, with the two teams trading rushes. Emil Heineman gave the Canadiens their first lead when he beat Jarry with a long shot on a 2-on-1. After that softie, the crowd serenaded the goalie with “Jarry! Jarry! Jarry!” chants.

Letang felt the Penguins were “horrible” in the second period, playing too loose.

“They have a ton of talent, a lot of skill. And when you play loose and don’t put pressure, it allows their guys to make plays,” he said. “So that’s what happened.”

But before that period ended, Eller single-handedly stemmed momentum with his second goal. He snaked his way up the ice and buried a beauty one versus three.

“It was a great play. It was a goal-scorer’s goal,” Sullivan said. “It was right under the bar. Guys draped all over him and he gets that kind of velocity on the shot and that kind of accuracy on the shot. I think he might even have surprised the goalie with his ability to get it off. It was a terrific play by him. Great individual effort.”

The Penguins regrouped heading into the third period. So did their goaltender.

Jarry made a few clutch saves before Hayes made it 4-3. The best might have come when Lane Hutson, the exciting rookie defenseman who had the Bell Centre crowd buzzing whenever he touched the puck, found Josh Anderson all alone in front.

It was another uneven night for Jarry, but those stops allowed the Penguins to win.

“I thought he got better as the game went on, for sure. I thought he made some big saves down the stretch. They pushed again when they pulled their goalie there at the end,” Sullivan said. “He made a couple of big saves there. He made a couple of [quietly] difficult saves that maybe didn’t look that difficult to the casual fan.”

Ice chips

• Rutger McGroarty was a healthy scratch Monday after he skated in Pittsburgh’s first three games of the season. Puljujarvi re-entered the lineup in his place. If the Penguins do not intend to play McGroarty in the short term, they could opt to send him to the American Hockey League so he can get more playing time there.

• Jack St. Ivany also came out of the lineup Monday in Montreal, with Ryan Shea replacing him on the Pittsburgh blue line. It was Shea’s first game of the season.

• Valtteri Puustinen was also a healthy scratch, making it four straight for him.

• Joel Blomqvist backed up Jarry versus Montreal. Alex Nedeljkovic participated in Monday’s morning skate. It looks as if he will be activated in the next few days.

• Cody Glass left the bench during the second period but returned for the third.

• Ex-Penguins defenseman Mike Matheson assisted on two of Montreal’s goals.

• Letang’s son, Alex, was in the house. “He got a million pucks in warmups. He was like asking for every player,” Letang chuckled. “But [Tuesday] he’s on the ice at 7, so he had to go to bed after the second period. Hopefully he’s already sleeping.”

• Before the game, Sullivan shared a few stories about coaching Martin St. Louis, who is now Montreal’s head coach. “He used to come into my office every morning after a game. He’d be in his underwear. No shoes on,” he said with a big grin. “He’d put his feet up on the desk and say, ‘Did you watch [the film from] the game?’”

• Sullivan enjoyed coaching St. Louis as a Tampa Bay assistant and “admired how invested he was,” and he is not surprised to see that he’s become an NHL coach.

Stat n’at

499 — With an empty-net goal, Malkin is now only one goal away from No. 500.

They said it

“I think it’s huge for the mentality of the team,” Eller said of the win. “You’re going to have times when you’re fighting it a little bit. We [bounced back] in the third.”

Coming up

After the win, the Penguins canceled their practice scheduled for Tuesday in Cranberry. They are back on the ice Wednesday for a home game against Buffalo.