Takeaways: Montreal Canadiens 4, Florida Panthers 0

The Florida Panthers came out of the holiday break battered and slow in their second-straight shutout defeat.

The Florida Panthers came out of the NHL’s three-day holiday break looking battered and slow, and it costed them in a 4-0 loss to the Montreal Canadiens.

Florida held Montreal without a shot for the first 6:32 of the game and played the game at its pace for a large majority of the first period, but when the second period rolled around, they could not keep up.

Kirby Dach scored two consecutive goals to flip the game on its head. The first came 1:39 into the second period, when the Panthers left Alex Newhook wide open in the circle and he found Dach cutting to the slot. Dach whiffed on the shot and saw it bounce in off his foot to put the Habs ahead 1-0. Later on in the second, Dach zoomed past Eetu Luostarinen after he took a spill and beat Spencer Knight on a breakaway with 6:09 to go in the middle frame.

The Panthers got a power play with a chance to regain momentum late in the second, but it had the opposite effect. They got out-worked in a slew of puck battles to start it, which led to a 2-on-1 rush that Jake Evans scored on to make it a 3-0 game.

Cole Caufield put a bow on the game with 5:43 to go, streaking past Aaron Ekblad and potting a rush chance home to give the Canadiens a 4-0 lead.

Florida was shut out for the second game in a row — the fourth time in its past eight games — to fall to 22-13-2 on the season.

Jakub Dobes recorded the shutout for Montreal in his first-career NHL game.

Here are three takeaways from Saturday afternoon’s game: