The Tampa Bay Lightning face the Montreal Canadiens in Game 4 on Sunday night at Bell Centre in Montréal, with puck drop set for 7 p.m. ET. Montreal leads the first-round series 2-1 after a 3-2 overtime win in Game 3.
For Tampa Bay, the trip north has already turned into a tight, stubborn series. Montreal opened with a 4-3 overtime win, Tampa Bay answered with a 3-2 overtime victory, and the Canadiens retook control in another overtime game. The Lightning are trying to even the series before it slips further away.
Andrei Vasilevskiy has not found much margin so far. He is 1-2 with an.880 save percentage in his two starts in the series, while Brandon Hagel has carried part of the offense with four goals and one assist for five points. Jake Guentzel has five assists and no goals through the first three games.
The numbers from the regular season suggest neither team has had much of an edge. Tampa Bay went 2-2-0 against Montreal in 2025-26, including a 6-1 win on Dec. 9, a 5-4 shootout win on Dec. 28, and losses in March and April by scores of 4-1 and 2-1. The teams have seen enough of each other that nothing has stayed clean for long.
That history also stretches deeper into the playoffs. Tampa Bay holds a 13-9 all-time postseason record against Montreal and is 5-5 on the road in those meetings. Nikita Kucherov remains the Lightning's all-time playoff scoring leader against the Canadiens with 11 goals, six assists and 17 points in 16 games, and Vasilevskiy is 5-3-0 with a.917 career save percentage across six playoff starts against Montreal.
Friday's lines and goaltenders are subject to change, but the stakes for Sunday are already fixed. If Tampa Bay wins at Bell Centre, the series resets. If Montreal wins again, the Canadiens will push the Lightning to the edge of elimination.
