The Canadiens are back at the Centre Bell tonight with a chance to push their win streak to six. The Winnipeg Jets visit on Tuesday, November 3, with puck drop at 7:00 PM ET. Montreal is 9-3-2 with 20 points and has won five straight, all without captain Nick Suzuki: 4-1 in Chicago, 2-1 in Winnipeg, 2-0 in St. Louis, 5-2 in Dallas and 5-4 against Pittsburgh on Saturday. Winnipeg is 4-8-3 with 11 points and arrives winless in nine games (0-7-2). The Canadiens confirmed that their lineup is unchanged from Saturday.

Same Lineup, Suzuki Still Out

There is no change for the Canadiens. Nick Suzuki hurt his left hand blocking a shot against San Jose on October 22 and was given two to four weeks, so he is not in the lineup and the group that won on Saturday goes again. Alex Newhook stays on the first line between Juraj Slafkovský and Cole Caufield, and the power-play units are the same as Saturday. See the Lineup Tonight page for every card and stat.

Group	Players
Line 1	Slafkovský – Newhook – Caufield
Line 2	Kreider – Evans – Anderson
Line 3	Texier – Danault – Bolduc
Line 4	Kapanen – Beck – F. Xhekaj
Defense	Hutson – Dobson
Defense	Guhle – Carrier
Defense	A. Xhekaj – Engström
Power play 1	Caufield, Newhook, Slafkovský, Bolduc, Hutson
Power play 2	Anderson, Kreider, Kapanen, Texier, Dobson
Goalies	Fowler (starter), Dobeš
Out	Suzuki, Dach, Matheson, Demidov, Montembeault

Look at how the lines are built. Newhook’s speed through the neutral zone gives Caufield and Slafkovský a driver on the first line, and the two spent about 14 minutes together at even strength on Saturday. Jake Evans centers the second line between Kreider and Anderson, while Kapanen, Beck and Florian Xhekaj give the fourth line energy and a hard forecheck. Texier, Danault and Bolduc remain the third line and the defense pairs do not change.

Five wins without the captain have come from depth, structure and goaltending, not from one line. The challenge tonight is to keep that same discipline at home against a team that needs a result.

Fowler Gets the Net

Jacob Fowler starts, the Canadiens confirmed. He made 25 saves on 29 shots in Saturday’s 5-4 win and is 7-1-0 with a .932 save percentage and a 1.84 goals-against average in eight games, and he stopped 33 of 34 shots when these teams met on October 25. Jakub Dobeš is 2-2-2 with a .853 save percentage and a 4.05 goals-against average in six games and is the backup. Tonight he goes for his eighth straight win. Carey Price and Jakub Dobeš each won seven in a row as Canadiens rookie goalies, so one more win would make Fowler the first rookie goalie in Canadiens history to reach eight. We broke down Fowler’s month in our Fowler Calder case article.

Know Your Opponent: The Jets

Winnipeg has lost its way since trading Connor Hellebuyck to New Jersey on Friday, October 23. The Jets are 0-5-0 since the trade and have been outscored 25-8: a 2-1 loss in Montreal’s Heritage Classic win, a 5-1 loss to Florida, a 6-4 loss to Tampa Bay, a 5-2 loss to Florida again and a 7-0 loss to Carolina on Sunday. They score 2.27 goals a game (30th in the league) and allow 3.60 (28th), and they are 2-4-1 at home and 2-4-2 on the road.

The talent is still dangerous. Kyle Connor has 11 goals and 15 points in 15 games and plays 21:03 a night. Mark Scheifele has 12 points (2 goals, 10 assists), Cole Perfetti has 11 points and Neal Pionk has 10 points while playing 24:10. Josh Morrissey is not in the projected lineup. In goal, the Jets have not named a starter. Stuart Skinner is 3-4-3 with a .887 save percentage and a 3.36 goals-against average in 10 games, Nico Daws is 0-1-0 with a .913 save percentage in two games, and Clay Stevenson is 1-3-0 with a .870 save percentage in five.

Special Teams Will Matter

This is where Montreal has to be sharp. The Canadiens’ power play is at 9.5 percent, the lowest in the league, and it went 0-for-3 against Pittsburgh on Saturday. Winnipeg’s penalty kill is 24th at 70.5 percent, so the opportunity is there if the first unit moves the puck quickly and shoots with traffic in front. On the other side, the Jets’ power play is 16.7 percent (24th) and Montreal’s penalty kill is 81.8 percent (12th). The Canadiens will not want to spend the night in the box against a team that needs any kind of lift.

Injury Updates

Nick Suzuki is out with a left-hand injury. Kirby Dach, who missed Saturday’s game with an illness, was back on the ice this morning at an optional practice, but he is not in tonight’s lineup. Mike Matheson is out for two weeks with a lower-body injury, Samuel Montembeault is day to day, and Ivan Demidov has not skated since he was given two to four weeks. He still wears a protective boot on his foot, and Tuesday marks the four-week maximum of the original timeline. Check the Injury Report for the latest.

History and What Comes Next

Montreal is 6-4-1 against Winnipeg in the 11 regular-season meetings since 2021-22, with a 32-33 goal difference. The Canadiens won 2-1 at the Heritage Classic on October 25 even though Winnipeg outshot them 34-21: Lane Hutson and Kaiden Guhle scored in the second period and Fowler made 33 saves. Read the full recap and our Penguins recap from Saturday. Tonight is also the first of the Canadiens’ ten games in the Hometown Remix uniform. After this game, the Canadiens host Utah on Thursday and visit Toronto on Saturday.

Three more notes. Juraj Slafkovský has recorded a point in each of his last four games against Winnipeg (one point in each). And a win would give the Canadiens a winning streak of six or more games for the fifth time in the past 10 years, since 2016-17. The other times were 2016-17 (eight and six games), 2024-25 (six games) and last season (eight games). Winnipeg, for its part, can extend its point streak in Montreal to four games, dating back to the 2023-24 season: the Jets earned a point in each of their last three visits, a shootout loss in October 2023, a 4-1 win in January 2025 and a shootout loss in December 2025.

The plan for tonight is simple: score first, stay out of the penalty box and give Fowler a lead to protect. Winnipeg is desperate and will push, and the Canadiens have shown this season that they can lose to teams they should beat, like the 4-3 overtime loss to San Jose on October 20. The better record and the better form are on Montreal’s side, and the team has already proved it can win without its captain. The job is to play the whole 60 minutes with the same discipline that built the streak.

Sources: official NHL statistics and RDS.