Criminal gesture after Canadiens' loss as police cruiser is set ablaze
The Canadiens dropped Game 6 by an 8-3 score against the Sabres on Saturday night, and the fallout spilled into the streets near the Bell Centre.
By midnight, a police cruiser as burning at the corner of Maisonneuve and Saint-Urbain. Firefighters knocked the flames down quickly. The damage was already done.
Surveillance cameras caught the suspects before and after the incident. Whether they were actually fans of the Tricolore is still an open question.
Buffalo finished the regular season at 50-23-9 with a plus-47 goal differential. Montreal sat one spot back at 48-24-10. Two heavyweights, one lopsided night.
Saturday was supposed to be the closeout. Up at home, in front of a building that has been deafening all spring, Martin St-Louis's group got steamrolled for sixty minutes.
Eight goals against. In an elimination game. At the Bell Centre. Lindy Ruff's Sabres looked like the team playing with house money, not the one staring down a season.
Then came the part nobody wants to see.
An 8-3 hangover Martin St-Louis cannot afford
The SPVM had issued a public warning that very morning, asking fans to keep things civil around the rink. A small group decided the warning was a suggestion.
The people in that footage represent a sliver of the crowd that filled downtown. A burning cruiser still ends up on the front page anyway.
And that is the frustrating part for everyone else. The pictures of a charred police car will travel further than any save or shift inside the building.
The hockey side is its own problem. A 5-goal loss at home, with a chance to punch your ticket to the East final, lives rent-free in a fan base's memory.
Carolina is sitting in the next round, watching tape, waiting on a name. Rod Brind'Amour's Hurricanes would love nothing more than a rattled opponent walking into their building.
What does this team have left in the tank after a night like Saturday? That is the real question hanging over the locker room before puck drop in the next one.
The off-ice noise will fade. The damage on the ice is the part St-Louis has to fix, fast, before this turns into something bigger than a bad night.
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YESTERDAY
MAY 16, 2026
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| G | A | PTS | ||
| Rasmus Dahlin | 1 | 4 | 5 | |
| Tage Thompson | 1 | 3 | 4 | |
| Jack Quinn | 2 | 1 | 3 | |
| Zach Benson | 1 | 1 | 2 | |
| Jake Evans | 1 | 1 | 2 | |
| Jason Zucker | 1 | 1 | 2 | |
| Ivan Demidov | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Konsta Helenius | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Zach Metsa | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Arber Xhekaj | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Bowen Byram | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Cole Caufield | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Lane Hutson | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Michael Matheson | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Ryan McLeod | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Josh Norris | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Mattias Samuelsson | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Josh Anderson | - | - | - | |
| Zachary Bolduc | - | - | - | |
| Alexandre Carrier | - | - | - | |
| COMPLETE STATS | ||||