Game

Canadiens at Sabres

Sabres 5, Canadiens 3 · first star Tage Thompson (3 G, 2 A).

2025-26 regular season · Preseason. The 2026-27 regular season starts Sep 29. Data as of September 28, 2026, source NHL.

Montreal Canadiens 3 at Buffalo Sabres 5

Canadiens MTL

3 FINAL 5

Sabres BUF

Thursday, January 15, 2026 · 7:00 PM ET · KeyBank Center, Buffalo

Line score by period
Team	1	2	3	T	SOG
Canadiens	2	1	0	3	23
Sabres	2	1	2	5	27

Shot chart

Every shot attempt, computed from the league's play-by-play coordinates. Canadiens attack left, Sabres attack right, all periods folded onto one rink. Attempts are plotted where the league recorded them, so the 2 marks in a team's own end are attempts logged from there: empty-net shots, long dumps on the net; 1 empty-net goal is drawn as a diamond. Boxscore shots on goal: MTL 23, BUF 27.

MTL in red BUF in blue goal empty-net goal shot on goal missed blocked Canadiens 23 shots on goal (3 goals, 13 missed, 7 blocked) attacking left; Sabres 27 shots on goal (5 goals, 12 missed, 18 blocked) attacking right.

Shots by period

Shots on goal, goals and attempts by period
Period	MTL SOG	MTL G	MTL ATT	BUF SOG	BUF G	BUF ATT
1st	7	2	11	12	2	28
2nd	8	1	14	10	1	15
3rd	8	0	18	5	2	14
Total	23	3	43	27	5	57

Shots by situation

Shots on goal and goals by strength of the shooting team
Situation	MTL SOG	MTL G	BUF SOG	BUF G
Even strength	20	1	23	3
Power play	3	2	4	2
Short-handed	0	0	0	0
Into an empty net	0	0	1	1

Attempt share by period

Sabres took 57.0% of the shot attempts, and 54.7% of the 75 attempts taken at 5-on-5. An attempt is a goal, a shot on goal, a miss or a blocked shot; CF% is the share of them belonging to the Sabres and FF% their share of the ones that were not blocked, so the Canadiens hold the remainder. All situations unless the 5-on-5 figure is named. All 32 teams

Attempt share by period, all situations, Canadiens at Sabres
Period	BUF CF%	BUF FF%
1st	71.8	63.0
2nd	51.7	50.0
3rd	43.8	40.9
Game	57.0	52.0

Team totals only: per-player on-ice numbers need shift data, which this source does not publish.

Scoring summary

1st period

03:11 Cole Caufield (22) Noah Dobson (21) · wrist 1–0
04:05 Tage Thompson (23) PP Noah Ostlund (7), Jason Zucker (11) · snap 1–1
10:30 Josh Doan (15) PP Tage Thompson (23), Noah Ostlund (8) · wrist 1–2
14:20 Ivan Demidov (11) PP Lane Hutson (38), Nick Suzuki (37) · slap 2–2

2nd period

03:05 Nick Suzuki (15) PP Lane Hutson (39), Cole Caufield (23) · snap 3–2
08:55 Alex Tuch (16) Tage Thompson (24), Rasmus Dahlin (27) · snap 3–3

3rd period

05:12 Tage Thompson (24) Josh Doan (19) · snap 3–4
18:20 Tage Thompson (25) EN Zach Benson (17) · wrist 3–5

Three stars

Tage Thompson BUF · C #72 · 3 G, 2 A
Josh Doan BUF · R #91 · 1 G, 1 A
Alex Tuch BUF · R #89 · 1 G, 0 A

Penalties

Penalties
Period	Time	Team	Player	Infraction	Min	Drawn by
1st	03:46	MTL	Lane Hutson	high sticking	2	Beck Malenstyn
1st	09:21	MTL	Kaiden Guhle	interference	2	Josh Doan
1st	12:50	BUF	Zach Benson	slashing	2	Brendan Gallagher
1st	13:46	BUF	Bowen Byram	high sticking	2	Lane Hutson
2nd	02:32	BUF	Jacob Bryson	holding	2	Zachary Bolduc
2nd	10:20	BUF	Bowen Byram	roughing	2	Mike Matheson
2nd	10:20	MTL	Mike Matheson	roughing	2	Bowen Byram
3rd	00:37	MTL	Phillip Danault	tripping	2	Jack Quinn
3rd	07:08	BUF	Jordan Greenway	roughing	2	Brendan Gallagher
3rd	07:08	MTL	Brendan Gallagher	roughing	2	Jordan Greenway
3rd	08:39	MTL	Oliver Kapanen	tripping	2	Tage Thompson

Boxscore

Montreal Canadiens

Canadiens skaters · by points
Player	Pos	G	A	PTS	+/-	SOG	HITS	BLK	PIM	FO%	TOI
Nick Suzuki #14	C	1	1	2	-1	2	0	0	0	63.6	22:17
Cole Caufield #13	R	1	1	2	-1	5	0	0	0	100.0	19:17
Lane Hutson #48	D	0	2	2	-1	1	0	2	2	0.0	25:55
Ivan Demidov #93	R	1	0	1	-1	3	0	0	0	0.0	16:10
Noah Dobson #53	D	0	1	1	-1	0	0	4	0	0.0	21:39
Joe Veleno #90	C	0	0	0	0	0	3	1	0	80.0	11:12
Oliver Kapanen #91	C	0	0	0	0	3	0	1	2	53.3	16:02
Phillip Danault #24	C	0	0	0	-2	0	3	2	2	45.5	14:58
Alexandre Texier #85	L	0	0	0	0	3	1	0	0	0.0	13:45
Juraj Slafkovský #20	L	0	0	0	-1	1	1	2	0	0.0	18:14
Sammy Blais #27	L	0	0	0	0	2	4	1	0	0.0	07:29
Brendan Gallagher #11	R	0	0	0	0	3	0	0	2	0.0	10:58
Josh Anderson #17	R	0	0	0	-1	0	1	0	0	0.0	13:27
Zachary Bolduc #76	R	0	0	0	-1	0	5	0	0	100.0	12:04
Alexandre Carrier #45	D	0	0	0	-1	0	0	4	0	0.0	21:00
Arber Xhekaj #72	D	0	0	0	0	0	6	0	0	0.0	10:29
Kaiden Guhle #21	D	0	0	0	0	0	1	1	2	0.0	14:56
Mike Matheson #8	D	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	2	0.0	22:32

Canadiens goalies
Goalie	DEC	SA	SV	GA	SV%	EV	PP	TOI
Jacob Fowler #32	L	26	22	4	.846	20/22	2/4	58:08

Buffalo Sabres

Sabres skaters · by points
Player	Pos	G	A	PTS	+/-	SOG	HITS	BLK	PIM	FO%	TOI
Tage Thompson #72	C	3	2	5	+2	3	0	1	0	41.2	20:43
Josh Doan #91	R	1	1	2	+1	1	1	0	0	0.0	16:55
Noah Ostlund #86	C	0	2	2	0	3	0	0	0	20.0	17:21
Alex Tuch #89	R	1	0	1	+1	1	4	0	0	0.0	18:44
Jason Zucker #17	L	0	1	1	0	0	1	1	0	25.0	14:27
Zach Benson #6	L	0	1	1	+1	2	1	0	2	0.0	16:06
Rasmus Dahlin #26	D	0	1	1	0	2	0	2	0	0.0	27:39
Peyton Krebs #19	C	0	0	0	+1	0	0	0	0	33.3	10:55
Ryan McLeod #71	C	0	0	0	0	1	1	0	0	55.6	18:29
Tyson Kozak #48	C	0	0	0	0	2	3	0	0	42.9	09:22
Beck Malenstyn #29	L	0	0	0	0	2	5	0	0	0.0	08:45
Jordan Greenway #12	L	0	0	0	0	0	3	1	2	0.0	11:10
Jack Quinn #22	R	0	0	0	0	1	1	0	0	0.0	14:21
Bowen Byram #4	D	0	0	0	+1	1	0	0	4	0.0	25:05
Jacob Bryson #78	D	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	2	0.0	06:02
Mattias Samuelsson #23	D	0	0	0	+2	4	0	1	0	0.0	25:24
Owen Power #25	D	0	0	0	0	3	1	0	0	0.0	23:04
Zach Metsa #73	D	0	0	0	+1	1	0	0	0	0.0	07:38

Sabres goalies
Goalie	DEC	SA	SV	GA	SV%	EV	PP	TOI
Colten Ellis #92	W	23	20	3	.870	19/20	1/3	59:47

SOG shots on goal · BLK blocked shots · FO% faceoff win percentage · EV / PP saves over shots by strength. Skaters sorted by points, then goals.

Source NHL (boxscore, play-by-play, game summary). Shot locations are the league's tracked coordinates; the chart and the situation tables are computed by Play-Pause Hockey. Data as of 2026-09-28.