Hal Gill

With their dominating performance over the Minnesota Wild this past Sunday, the Montreal Canadiens have all but assured themselves a birth in the 2011 Stanley Cup playoffs. With a comfortable 11 point cushion over the 9th place Buffalo Sabres, the team can start looking ahead to the second season and begin working on following up last year's thrilling run to the conference finals.

Confront them with annihilation, and they will then survive; plunge them into a deadly situation, and they will then live. When people fall into danger, they are then able to strive for victory. —Sun Tzu

I have always admired this quote and will probably be providing you with many more of Mr. Tzu’s in the future. His depiction of strategy in battle can be applied in any facet of life.

Two games are on the books and one finger on the panic button.

The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Montreal Canadiens 3-0 in game two of the Eastern Conference final and now travel to Montreal with a 2-0 lead to face the Habs Thursday night at the Bell Centre.

The Habs looked better than they did in game one, putting more pressure on Michael Leighton’s net, but still haven’t scored their first goal of the series. On the other hand, Philly has put in nine unanswered goals.

While the Western Conference Finals sees the top two seeds square off to determine a Stanley Cup Finalist, the Eastern Conference has provided quite a twist this postseason.

The seventh-seeded Philadelphia Flyers and the eighth-seeded Montreal Canadiens. two very unlikely picks to get this far, are set to do battle for the right to represent the East in the Cup Final.

The Montreal Canadiens have turned their city upside down, as the club tries to get back to the Finals since winning it all in 1993.

This has been a hockey postseason of the unprecedented and miraculous feats, with the audacity of Canada’s emergence in the NHL to renew a cultural event north of the border. The sport originated in Canada, a prominent atmosphere where the masses are entertained and embraces a thrilling game played on thick layers of ice.

Courage always seems to show itself in some unique fashion during the Stanley Cup Playoffs.  It's either the superstar forward who, only after his season has ended, reveals he played through a broken ankle, or the super-pest who continually shows up and competes despite a cracked rib or two. 

That's when we start to mention Sami Salo, and his heroics to try and help salvage his Canucks' season by playing through the most painful of "lower body" injuries.  

Well, they did it. The Canadiens forced a Game Seven against the Penguins.

For all of the Pens fans who have argued with me since this series started that the Canadiens were a write off, a team that couldn't even skate in the same rink as the Pens, consider this your wake-up call.

In beating the Pens 4-3 at the Bell Centre last night, the Canadiens have done the improbable two rounds in a row, in forcing a higher seed to a decisive Game Seven.

This year's Montreal Canadiens weren't even supposed to make a squeak in the 2010 Stanley Cup Playoffs. However, they've upset the top team in the NHL and are still on a roll. And it is thanks to many playoff performers who have come out of the woodwork to help the Canadiens get far in the race for the Cup.

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Oh...my...god!  What an incredible game.  And by incredible, I mean stomach-churning, stress-inducing, hair-losing, nail-biting hockey.
 
Wow.

In defeating the Washington Capitals 2-1 in Game Seven last night, the Montreal Canadiens became the first No. 8 seed to come back from a 3-1 series deficit against a No. 1 seed since the NHL adopted the current playoff format in 1994.

For a franchise that owns the record books I think it is fitting that they add this achievement to their already full mantle of accolades.

Habs win, Habs win!

OK, now that I got that out of the way, let me get to the nitty-gritty. Yes, the Montreal Canadiens beat the Washington Capitals 2-1 in Washington last night.

And yes, the game seemed to follow the same script as three out of the five games so far: the Habs came out with fire in their eyes and took an early lead. The Caps scored to bring the Caps back into it and pressed for the tie in the third.

This time, however, it was not to be for the Capitals, as the Habs' goaltender, Jaroslav Halak, stood on his head and kept the Caps off of the board.