This time it’s true, Josh Anderson is back!

Anderson scored twice as the Canadian scored four goals in the second half and the Montreal club defeated the New York Islanders 5-3 on Saturday night at the Bell Centre.

Head coach Martin St-Louis said a few weeks ago that Anderson was back after playing a few good games but never scoring.

Anderson scored his first goal on December 4th against the Seattle Kraken, but into an empty net.

This time Anderson beat goalkeeper Semyon Varlamov twice, scoring his first goals of the season against a goalkeeper in his 30th year of play^e to match.

The Canadian was barely able to maintain his 4-0 lead in the third period and ended his 2023 home game with a good result.

Joel Armia, Cole Caufield and Christian Dvorak also scored goals in an empty net for the Canadian (13-13-4). Justin Barron, Sean Monahan and Nick Suzuki each had two assists and Samuel Montembeault made 31 saves.

For the Islanders (14-8-8), Brock Nelson scored twice and Bo Horvat also scored. Noah Dobson had three assists and Varlamov stopped 36 shots.

Forward Jake Evans was part of the Canadian squad after missing the team’s practice for the past two days.

The Canadian will play three times abroad next week before his Christmas break. He will visit the Winnipeg Jets on Monday, the Minnesota Wild on Thursday and the Chicago Blackhawks on Friday.

A stressful ending

The Canadian spent a lot of time in the offensive zone in the first period, but the Islanders did a good job protecting the slot and the front of the net.

Just over 13 minutes into the game, Varlamov was lucky when Brendan Gallagher parried Johnathan Kovacevic’s shot onto the post. On the return, the puck was stopped by Alexander Romanov’s skate, then Varlamov dove to frustrate Dvorak.

The Habs took control of the game in the second period.

Armia scored first at 7:45, taking advantage of a good shot from Gallagher before beating Varlamov on the glove side.

Anderson then scored at 10:35. He was hit in the slot by a shot from Barron, then beat Varlamov by firing while spinning.

The power forward returned to the attack with 52.4 seconds left. Anderson ignored defenseman Mike Reilly’s coverage and charged to the net to beat Varlamov.

Caufield then increased the score to 4-0 for the Canadian with 37.9 seconds left. Juraj Slafkovsky caused Romanov to lose control of the puck behind his net. Suzuki quickly joined Caufield and the American striker scored with a one-timer.

Nelson revived the Islanders when he took advantage of the Canadian’s sloppiness to score shorthanded at 2:07 of the third period.

He came back 1:36 later on a nice crossfield pass from Dobson.

St-Louis called a timeout to slow the Islanders’ momentum, and the Canadian calmed down for a while.

Horvat finally cut the lead to one goal with 5:54 left by scoring a rebound off a Dobson shot.

The Canadian managed to finish off the Islanders at the end of the game. Dvorak confirmed the result by firing into an empty net with 19.3 seconds left.

To watch in the video