MONTREAL -- The Montreal Canadiens have another chance at their first winning streak in over two months.
Richard Zednik and Joe Juneau each had a goal and an assist Saturday to lead Montreal to a 5-1 win over the Atlanta Thrashers.
Jan Bulis, Mike Ribeiro and Niklas Sundstrom also scored for the Canadiens, who extended their unbeaten streak to three. Montreal, which hosts Washington on Sunday, has earned a point in eight of 10 games (5-2-2-1), yet hasn't won consecutive games in 12 tries since Oct. 20-23.
"It's obviously going to be nice the day that we get a couple of wins together, but you have to also realize that the ties we got on the road were pretty big," Juneau said. "It wasn't three wins, but it was points in every game."
Jose Theodore stopped 27 shots and came within 4:50 of a shutout before allowing Chris Tamer's goal at 15:10 of the third with the Canadiens up 4-0.
"They had their scoring chances but they just couldn't bury them, and when we had ours, we scored the big goals," Theodore said.
Atlanta has lost four straight (3-0-0-1) including a 2-1 home loss to Montreal on Dec. 29 -- after winning three in a row.
"They played well," Thrashers captain Shawn McEachern said. "They had their forecheck going pretty good and they were fast tonight."
Canadiens captain Saku Koivu returned to the lineup after missing a 1-1 tie in Dallas on Wednesday.
Koivu, who assisted on Zednik's power-play goal, missed that game because of a mild concussion when he was elbowed in the chin Monday by Atlanta's Marc Savard. Savard was booed by the sellout crowd of 21,273 every time he touched the puck.
Montreal, which scored just six times on a 1-1-1-1 trip, has won three straight at home, outscoring its opponents 14-6 over that span.
Michael Ryder assisted on both Montreal goals in the first as the Canadiens jumped to a 2-0 lead after 8:35.
Bulis opened the scoring with his eighth goal at 1:44, and Zednik increased the lead to two on his team-leading 13th goal just 16 seconds after Atlanta's Ivan Majesky was sent off for interference.
Ribeiro completed a fine passing play to make it 3-0 midway through the second. Left alone on the left side to take Richard Zednik's cross-ice pass, defenseman Francis Bouillon set up Ribeiro, who put the puck into a wide open net from the right edge of the crease at 9:20.
Sundstrom put the Canadiens up by four with 6.6 seconds remaining in the period with his second goal in as many games. Joe Juneau passed the puck back to Sundstrom, who scored from the slot for his fifth goal.
Canadiens defenseman Sheldon Souray shoved Atlanta's Benjamin Simon to the ice after a stoppage 23 seconds into the third before fighting with Tamer, the first of three separate bouts between the teams in the period.
Juneau scored a power-play goal with 24.8 remaining.
Notes
- Byron Dafoe, who had won four of his six previous starts, fell to 4-6 in 10 games this season.
- The Canadiens are 12-2-0 when leading after the first period, and 14-2-0 when ahead after two periods.
- Theodore improved to 7-3-4 in his last 15 starts.
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