Newhook’s overtime goal sends Canadiens past Sabres in Game 7

Alex Newhook’s overtime goal at 11:22 turned a tense Game 7 into a defining moment for the Montreal Canadiens, a 3-2 win over the Buffalo Sabres that sent one of hockey’s most recognizable franchises back to the Eastern Conference Final. In a first-ever Game 7 between the clubs, Montreal survived a crowd at KeyBank Center, a Buffalo push that had forced the decider with an 8-3 Game 6 rout, and a series that kept tilting late until Newhook finished a cross-ice feed from Alexandre Carrier.

The result carried meaning far beyond one night in Buffalo, New York. Montreal entered as the No. 3 seed from the Atlantic Division, while Buffalo came in as the division’s top seed, and the Canadiens knocked out a higher-seeded team in the 203rd Game 7 in Stanley Cup Playoffs history. For a Montreal market that measures relevance by spring pressure, not regular-season promise, the win felt like a public declaration that the rebuild has reached a more credible stage. Game 1 against the Carolina Hurricanes is set for Thursday in Raleigh, North Carolina.

The Canadiens’ path also underscored how much strain this team has already absorbed. Montreal played its 26th all-time Game 7 and had won 16 of its previous 25 before beating Buffalo. It was the club’s second Game 7 of the 2026 playoffs after the first-round escape from Tampa Bay, another road winner-take-all game that required Newhook’s go-ahead goal and came despite Montreal generating only nine shots on goal. That earlier comeback, followed by this one, has given Martin St. Louis’ group a postseason identity built less on aesthetics than on nerve.

St. Louis carries his own historical thread into that identity, as part of Tampa Bay’s 2011 playoff run, while Luke Schenn was the only player on either roster in the NHL at that time. Montreal’s present is still being judged against the franchise’s past, but the repeat ability to survive elimination games on the road suggests something more than luck. St. Louis called the Tampa Bay breakthrough a “big moment” and said the Canadiens were “a hard team to beat” when they were at their level, a line that sounded like optimism then and felt closer to evidence after Buffalo.

Jakub Dobes made 37 saves to hold the line, while Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen stopped 22 shots for Buffalo. Phillip Danault and Zachary Bolduc scored Montreal’s regulation goals, and Rasmus Dahlin and Jordan Greenway answered for the Sabres. The finish was instant-classic theater, but the deeper question now is whether Montreal has only caught a hot postseason wave or has finally arrived at the point where playoff relevance is no longer a surprise.