Marc Dumont
The Montreal Canadiens (42-21-10) will face the Tampa Bay Lightning (46-21-6) on Tuesday night, with the puck drop scheduled for 7 pm ET.
It will be third time these two teams meet, with the Lightning winning both previous matchups. Montreal lost 6-1 in early December, and while the Habs offered a much better effort the next meeting, they still ended up dropping a 5-4 decision in late December.
Simply put, Tampa Bay is the type of team that gives Montreal fits. As it stands, if the playoffs started today, the Canadiens would be facing the Buffalo Sabres, but there are also decent odds they end up facing the Lightning in the first round of the playoffs depending on how the final stretch of the season unfolds.
Lineup Changes
Jakub Dobes is set to start versus Tampa Bay, and will aim to win his fourth game in a row, a continuation of the excellent results that led to him being named the First Star of the Week in the NHL.
As for the rest of the lineup, the Habs announced defenceman Alex Carrier would miss between two and four weeks with an upper-body injury which explains why they recalled Adam Engstrom from the Laval Rocket (AHL).
Engstrom, 24, can play on either the left or the right, and is clearly Laval’s most productive defenceman. He’s also the most NHL-ready player on the farm, and while calling up David Reinbacher would have been interesting, it’s unwise to toss someone to the wolves at this point of the NHL season. Reinbacher’s time will come, eventually.
That being said, Engstrom is not expected to play on Tuesday. Rather, Arber Xhekaj practiced alongside Kaiden Guhle, giving us a fairly good indication of the likely defensive pairing, and putting an end to his one-game experiment as a fourth-line forward.
Montreal Canadiens Projected Lineup
Cole Caufield – Nick Suzuki – Juraj Slafkovsky
Alex Newhook – Oliver Kapanen – Ivan Demidov
Zach Bolduc – Jake Evans – Josh Anderson
Joe Veleno – Phillip Danault – Brendan Gallagher
Mike Matheson – Noah Dobson
Kaiden Guhle – Arber Xhekaj*
Jayden Struble- Lane Hutson
Jakub Dobes
Tampa Bay Lightning Projected Lineup
Brandon Hagel – Anthony Cirelli – Nikita Kucherov
Gage Gonclaves – Brayden Point – Jake Guentzel
Zemgus Girgensons – Yanni Gourde – Pontus Holmberg
Corey Perry – Nick Paul – Oliver Bjorkstrand
Darren Raddysh – J.J. Moser
Ryan McDonagh – Erik Cernak
Emil Lilleberg – Charle-Edouard D’Astous
Andrei Vasilevskiy
How To Watch The Habs Vs. The Bolts
The Montreal Canadiens versus the Tampa Bay Lightning, Tuesday, March 31, 2026, will be aired on RDS and TSN2. An instant recap complete with highlights will be available on Sportsnaut as soon as the final whistle is blown.
