Caufield extends point streak to 9, lifts Canadiens past Jets in shootout

MONTREAL -- Cole Caufield had an assist to extend his point streak to nine games, and scored the lone goal in the shootout for the Montreal Canadiens in a 3-2 win against the Winnipeg Jets at Bell Centre on Wednesday.

Caufield, who has the longest active point streak in the NHL, snapped a shot inside the right post on Montreal’s first shot attempt, and Jakub Dobes stopped all three Winnipeg shooters.

Juraj Slafkovsky and Oliver Kapanen scored, and Dobes made 29 saves for the Canadiens (14-9-3), who had lost consecutive games following a three-game winning streak, including a 5-2 loss to the Ottawa Senators on Tuesday,

“It was a momentum-filled game, and I think last night we didn’t really handle that well,” Montreal forward Jake Evans said. “And tonight was one of our most complete 60-minute games, or 65-, I guess, minute game. Every line contributed and that’s a good team over there that we fought to the very end with.”

Mark Scheifele and Kyle Connor each had a goal and an assist, and Eric Comrie made 29 saves for the Jets (13-12-1), who are 1-5-1 in their past seven games.

“That’s the blueprint that we need to look at, and if we do that, we’ll get wins,” Scheifele said. “Hopefully we can build on that game.”

Winnipeg coach Scott Arniel was pleased with the team’s response following a 5-1 loss at the Buffalo Sabres on Monday.

“I don’t think we gave up any odd-man situations, but if we did they were very limited compared to last game,” Arniel said. “We did a great job of not only our forwards getting over top of people, tracking back, but our ‘D’ did a great job with their gaps.

“That was a battle of two good goaltenders. Dobes and Comrie, both goaltenders made some big stops and there was a lot of different looks for each team. And at the end of the day, I would have liked the two points but I’m happy with our effort.”

Scheifele gave the Jets a 1-0 lead at 18:35 of the first period. He took Connor’s backhand pass as he drove the slot and put a wrist shot past Dobes’ glove from the hash marks.

Slafkovsky tied it 1-1 at 9:59 of the second period with his second power-play goal in as many nights. Caufield fed a pass from behind the net to Slafkovsky, who snapped a one-timer past Comrie from low in the left face-off circle to finish off a passing play started by Nick Suzuki.

Caufield has 11 points (two goals, nine assists) during the streak, including assists in eight straight games.

“I think he is an underrated playmaker, honestly,” Slafkovsky said of Caufield. “Like obviously he has a good shot, but he can make all the little plays, all the slips and stuff. So he’s a perfect goal-scorer, but he’s also a great playmaker.”

Suzuki has 10 points (four goals, six assists) during a seven-game point streak, including assists in six straight games.

Connor scored in his third straight game to put Winnipeg back ahead 2-1 at 11:53. He snapped a one-timer past Dobes glove side from low in the left circle on Gabriel Vilardi’s pass from behind the net.

Kapanen then tied it 2-2 at 14:03. Ivan Demidov won a puck battle in the right corner with Winnipeg defenseman Josh Morrissey before passing to Kapanen, who escaped coverage to score on a snap shot from the right hash mark.

NOTES: Scheifele has six points (three goals, three assists) during a five-game streak. It was his 30th career point streak of at least five games, passing Blake Wheeler for the most such streaks in Jets/Atlanta Thrashers franchise history. … Demidov has 20 points (six goals, 14 assists) in 26 games. He is the second-fastest teenager in Canadiens history to reach 20 points in season, behind only Stephane Richer, who accomplished the feat in his first 19 games in 1985-86. … Caufield pulled within one game of tying his career-long point streak of 11 games (2023-24). … Montreal assigned forward Florian Xhekaj and defenseman Adam Engstrom to Laval of the American Hockey League after the game.