One Shot to See Fans During the Habs vs Leafs Series

Playoff hockey is back in Canada and as per usual, games will see no fans in attendance come the first puck drop of the 2021 Stanley Cup Playoffs. But that doesn’t mean we might not see them at all. There still remains one shot at seeing fans in the arena and it might not take any miracles to see it happen. 

 

Quebec announced their plans to allow an indoor venue attendance of 2500 people, or in this case fans. Quebec announced their intention to lift all public curfews as well. Both moves are set to become official starting May 28th just one day prior to the Game 6 matchup being the Montreal Canadiens, and the Toronto Maple Leafs.

 

Canadiens Brendan Gallagher

(statschew / Flickr)

The top-seeded Leafs will visit the Habs on back-to-back nights for games 3 and 4, before returning home to Toronto for game 5. With Ontario still struggling to get their Covid-19 spread under control it doesn’t look as though the same attendance permits will be implemented, meaning the Habs will have one shot to see their home-ice fans for the first time in over a year, that being Game 6.

 

While not impossible it might prove to be a true grind for the Habs to make it to Game 6, as their opponent Leafs boast one of the top offensive attacks in the National Hockey League. The Leafs finished first in the North division with a record of 35-14-7 while the Canadiens finished fourth going 24-21-11.

 

Canadiens’ executive vice-president and chief commercial officer France Margaret Belanger said in a statement “although the number of spectators remains limited, we applaud this decision which allows us to foresee an eventual return to normality”. Belanger would later add “we really missed our fans and spectators and we cannot wait to host them again”.

 

The Leafs and Habs series will start Thursday May 20th at 4:30pm on CBC.

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