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Plekanec's natural hat trick leads Canadiens past Bruins

Sep 23, 2007 - 10:29 PM HALIFAX, Nova Scotia (Ticker) -- Tomas Plekanec scored a natural hat trick and Christopher Higgins scored the go-ahead goal to help the Montreal Canadiens to a 4-3 win over the Boston Bruins in a preseason contest Sunday.

The fourth-year center's first goal came courtesy a tip from a Mark Streit shot at 3:30 of the opening period.

The second was a neat deke of Bruins goalie Manny Fernandez on the power play at 13:58 of the first and the third was a wrist shot as the first of two Boston penalties expired at 9:32 of the second period.

Higgins netted the go-ahead goal with 1:35 to play in the second period when his wrist shot from the high slot eluded Fernandez.

The Boston goalie got a small measure of revenge when he stopped Higgins on a penalty shot just 30 seconds later, sticking out his right pad to foil the deke after Higgins had been hauled down on a clear breakaway.

Chuck Kobasew, Glen Murray and Phil Kessel replied for the Bruins.

Kobasew redirected a pass from David Krejci at 17:02 of the second period, while Murray one-timed a blast at 4:39 of the third. Kessel snapped his goal past Montreal netminder Jaroslav Halak with just nine seconds left on the clock and Fernandez on the bench for an extra skater.

After allowing the Canadiens to dictate play through the first two periods, the Bruins controlled the third, outshooting the Bruins 13-4. Montreal held a 37-30 shots advantage overall.

Halak finished with 27 saves to pick up his first win of the preseason. Fernandez, who came to the Bruins from the Minnesota Wild in an offseason trade, stopped 33 shots and has two losses and no wins in exhibition play.

Many of the near-capacity crowd of 9,967 at Halifax Metro Centre were cheering on the Canadiens, but Murray's goal also got a roar.

The 34-year-old Murray is a native of Bridgewater, N.S., a small town on the province's south shore just an hour from Halifax.

Not in the lineup were captain and center Saku Koivu, forward Alex Kovalev, defenseman Andrei Markov and goalie Christobal Huet. The notable absence for the Bruins was defenseman Zdeno Chara.