Toronto Maple Leafs vs. Montreal Canadiens NHL Picks, Odds, Predictions 5/24/2021
Toronto Maple Leafs (36-15-7) vs. Montreal Canadiens (25-22-11)
May 24, 2021 7:00 pm EDT
The Line: Montreal Canadiens +122 / Toronto Maple Leafs -135; Over/Under: 5.5
(Get latest betting odds)
The Toronto Maple Leafs and the Montreal Canadiens meet in game three of their best-of-seven NHL First Round matchup fron the Bell Centre on Monday night.
The Toronto Maple Leafs will look to win back-to-back games after evening the series up at one win apiece following their 5-1 win over Montreal last time out.
Jesperi Kotkaniemi opened the scoring for the Habs just under eight minutes into the game but Jason Spezza would tie the game at one for Toronto just 4:28 later. Auston Matthews would give the LEafs the lead with his first goal of the playoffs 5:15 into the second period and Rasmus Sandin would push the lead to 3-1 with less than seven minutes to go in the middle frame as Toronto bombarded Montreal in the second frame, owning a 20-8 advantage in terms of shots on goal. William Nylander pushed the lead to 4-1 just under nine minutes into the 3rd and Alex Kerfoot would ice the win for the Leafs on an empty net with just over a minute to play as Montreal went quietly without much of a fight heading into game three.
Jack Campbell got the win for Toronto between the pipes after stopping 22 of 23 shots faced in the winning effort while Carey Price took the loss in goal for Montreal after allowing 4 goals on 33 shots faced in defeat.
Toronto is 23-9 in their last 32 games following a win and 7-3 in their last 10 games overall while the under is 4-1-1 in their last 6 Monday games. Montreal is 1-4 in their last 5 games as an underdog and 1-6 in their last 7 games overall while the under is 7-3-1 in their last 11 home games. The under is 5-2-1 in the last 8 meetings between these two teams and 4-1-1 in the last 6 meetings between these two teams in Montreal.
Montreal has a definite edge at home being the first Canadian teams to have fans in the stands as about 2,500 fans will be in attendance for this game, but Toronto knows this and will try to negate the edge from the opening puck drop. I think this game is a physical war considering the chippiness that we saw at the end of game two and overtime certainly isn’t out of the question either. Give me the under in this one.
