Montreal Canadiens goaltender Jacob Fowler makes a save against the Pittsburgh Penguins during second period NHL hockey action in Montreal, Saturday, Dec. 20, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes

MONTREAL — Sidney Crosby arrived in Montreal on the brink of history. Jacob Fowler made sure it would have to wait.

Fowler stopped 31 shots for his first career shutout, lifting the Montreal Canadiens to a 4-0 win over the slumping Pittsburgh Penguins and keeping Crosby one point shy of Mario Lemieux on the all-time scoring list.

Canadiens fans cheered and chanted Fowler’s name after he earned the game’s first star, disrupting the 21-year-old’s on-ice interview as he looked up at the Bell Centre crowd, smiling in disbelief.

"It's crazy. I feel like it's pretty undeserved,” he said. “I haven't really done much here, but I don't know, it's kind of addicting. You want to hear it more and more.

“Hopefully I can put some more good games together and hear it again."

On a night Crosby hoped to pass his idol, the rookie goaltender denied his own hero of becoming Pittsburgh’s franchise leader in points.

Fowler grew up a Penguins fan, idolizing Crosby and longtime goaltender Marc-André Fleury, but swore he didn’t realize “Sid the Kid” entered the night sitting at 1,722 points — one back of Lemieux.

"I mean, I didn't know that, I think any time he's on the ice though, you're alert,” Fowler said. “He's one of my favourite players, you know when he's on the ice every time and you want to stop him, so just lucky I got the better end of it tonight.”

His early NHL results — amid some unfair outside expectations as the team’s saviour — have been mixed, but both of his wins have come against his boyhood team.

The Canadiens (19-12-4) recalled Fowler from the AHL’s Laval Rocket on Dec. 9, searching for answers as Sam Montembeault and Jakub Dobes struggled to keep pucks out of Montreal’s net.

In his debut, Fowler made 36 saves in a 4-2 win over the Penguins. Then he dropped his next two starts, including a 4-1 defeat to the Flyers in which his misplay of the puck handed Philadelphia its third goal.

On Saturday, however, Fowler was locked in from the beginning, looking calm and collected in front of a team that limited Pittsburgh’s Grade A chances.

He denied Kevin Hayes on a break six minutes into the night, bailing out defenceman Adam Enstrom after his turnover. Early in the second, he slid across his crease for a huge save on Connor Dewar, prompting the first “Fow-ler! Fow-ler!” chants of the evening.

"He's got a lot of confidence,” head coach Martin St. Louis said. “He believes in himself, and it's not arrogance — big difference. It's a confident kid and he plays very mature, and all these games he's getting right now, you can't buy that experience.

“Playing on a Saturday night at home, you can't buy that, you got to live through it. Obviously he did that tonight and did a heck of a job. … The way he carries himself, he seems like he's been ready for this for a long time."

Through four games, Fowler has a .915 save percentage and 2.49 goals-against average, putting pressure on the Canadiens’ management to keep him in the NHL longer.

"I'm just trying to earn every day,” Fowler said. “I didn't have a lot of expectations for time up here this year. For me it's just trying to make it hard to stay out of the net. I feel like if I'm doing that, then it means the team's doing well, and everybody has the same goal for this team to keep winning — and I want to be a part of it."

Dobes has a .893 save percentage and 2.91 GAA, though he has allowed just two goals combined in his past two starts.

Montembeault, the incumbent No. 1, was sent to Laval on a conditioning loan Tuesday after posting a dismal 3.65 GAA and .857 save percentage this season.

He stopped 47 of 52 shots in two games with the Rocket and was expected to rejoin the Canadiens on Sunday ahead of their rematch against the Penguins in Pittsburgh, but the NHL club had not confirmed the move as of Saturday night.

Asked Saturday morning whether he had explored the trade market amid the uncertainty in Montreal’s crease, general manager Kent Hughes said he believed the situation could be resolved internally.

“Sam is with Laval just to have the chance to take a little break here, regain his confidence and we know what he is,” Hughes said. “We've all seen it the last three years. We know that Sam is capable of being a good goalie, it's a question of whether it's next week, whether it will be in two weeks, whether it'll be in a month.

“And we're trying to find ways to speed up his return to form."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 21, 2025.

News from © The Canadian Press, 2025