Pinto scores twice, Senators grow wild-card lead with win against Canadiens

OTTAWA -- Shane Pinto scored twice, and the Ottawa Senators expanded their lead for the first wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Eastern Conference with a 5-2 win against the Montreal Canadiens at Canadian Tire Centre on Friday.

“A great atmosphere, kind of like a playoff-like atmosphere,” Pinto said. “It was fun. A good win.”

Ridly Greig had a goal and an assist, Drake Batherson and Dylan Cozens each scored, and Linus Ullmark made 20 saves for the Senators (43-30-6), who are now five points ahead of the Canadiens.

“I don’t want to say I challenged our team, but I talked to our group about where our game was at and where it needs to get to,” Ottawa coach Travis Green said. “This was going to be as close to a playoff-like game as we were going to get before the end of the regular season and we treated it that way.”

Christian Dvorak and Nick Suzuki each scored, and Sam Montembeault made 28 saves for Montreal (39-31-9), which had won six straight.

“We’ve got to dial in our starts and start on time,” Canadiens forward Cole Caufield said. “We can’t always come back all the time. It’s not any sort of panic button, but it’s for sure something that we’ve got to look ourselves in the mirror and face head on.”

Montreal could have clinched a playoff spot and moved within a point of Ottawa for the first wild card with a regulation win. The Canadiens hold the second wild card, six points ahead of the Columbus Blue Jackets and New York Rangers.

“It happens, right? Eighty-two games, you’re going to have off nights,” Montreal defenseman Kaiden Guhle said. “But it’s a tough, tough night. I mean, myself, I wasn’t nearly good enough for the team today. I didn’t feel great.”

Pinto gave the Senators a 1-0 lead 28 seconds into the first period when he finished on a centering pass from Greig at the edge of the crease.

“I thought we just got on them quick,” Pinto said of the team’s start. “Got behind them, forechecked their D. I think that’s been our MO all year. We got two quick goals in front of the net and that obviously set us up for a pretty good game.”

Cozens scored on a Nikolas Matinpalo rebound crashing the net to push it to 2-0 at 4:18.

“Can we bend not break in the first period? We haven’t been able to do that,” Canadiens coach Martin St. Louis said. “Fortunately, I felt like we stopped the bleeding at 2-0; I just wanted to get out of that period down 2-0. But some nights, it’s just too big of a hole.”

Greig made it 3-0 at 1:05 of the second period. Michael Amadio picked up a rim from Jake Sanderson behind the net and fed Greig in front for the quick shot.

“I’ve said it multiple times: I think me, ‘Rids’ and Amadio just kind of read off of each other pretty well,” Pinto said. “We cover for each other well, we check well. It’s just fun to play with them, and I think we enjoy trying to be that matchup line.”

Dvorak cut it to 3-1 at 2:26 when he accepted a stretch pass from Joel Armia, skated in on a partial break and beat Ullmark glove side with a wrist shot.

Batherson tipped Thomas Chabot’s point shot to extend the lead to 4-1 at 14:14.

Suzuki cut it to 4-2 at 15:32. Juraj Slafkovsky’s centering pass eked through Matinpalo, settled right in front of Suzuki in the slot, and he scored glove side on Ullmark.

Pinto scored into an empty net for the 5-2 final at 17:44 of the third period.

“They’ve been amazing,” Chabot said of the line of Pinto, Greig and Amadio. “I mean, they shut down the best line every single night. And tonight, they hung on to the puck in [Montreal’s] zone, they made them play defense, which, we know they like playing off the rush, so when you make them defend all night, you know they’re not going to gain momentum. All credit goes to them.”

NOTES: Caufield, Suzuki and Mike Matheson were each a game-worst minus-3. … Pinto, Amadio and Greig were each a game-best plus-3. … Sanderson became the sixth defenseman to record 100 assists with the Senators. Only two did it quicker: Erik Karlsson (196 games) and Chabot (225 games). … Each Ottawa defenseman had an assist. … Pinto became the fifth Senator to hit the 20-goal mark this season. Ottawa has had more 20-goal scorers in a season only twice: 2022-23 and 2005-06. … The Senators improved to 24-1-1 this season when Pinto records a point.