A win is still a win, even when it comes against a weak team. For the Pittsburgh Penguins, Thursday’s 2-1 overtime win over the Anaheim Ducks was somewhat cathartic as Pittsburgh dominated their visitors and snap their six-game losing streak. The Ducks are not a great team offensively and they are even worse defensively, and as such they lay all their hopes on their goaltending. That is exactly how things went for the first forty minutes of the game, and it took another genius deflection by Sidney Crosby to bring the Penguins level early in the third period.

Then the captain sealed the deal in the overtime period when he stole the puck from Cutter Gauthier in the offensive zone then had all the time in the world to wait out Anaheim goaltender Lukas Dokstal before flipping the puck over the Ducks’ netminder’s blocker and into the goal. Altogether it’s a win Pittsburgh desperately needed to save face, if not to get back to respectability.

Tonight the Penguins will hope to feast on another team which struggles defensively as the Montreal Canadiens come to Pittsburgh for the second of three meetings between the two teams. After losing to the Penguins 6-3 on October 14, the Canadiens have gone 2-4-1 and have allowed almost six goals against per game in that time frame. Unlike Anaheim, Montreal doesn’t have a goaltender who will stand on his head to keep the team in games, and their tandem of Sam Montembeault and Cayden Primeau are the fourth-worst in terms of save percentage.

The Canadiens would probably be in better shape if they hadn’t started the season without sniper Patrik Laine and David Reinbacher, their fifth overall pick from two years ago who seemed poised to anchor their blueline this season. The good news for Montreal is that they are hanging in there without these two top-end players, and hopefully for them they will still be in the playoff hunt by the time Laine and Reinbacher get back to full health.