It's no secret that the Penguins will be heavily favored to defeat Montreal in the best-of-five qualifying round that begins next Saturday in Toronto.
After all, they finished 15 points ahead of the Canadiens during the regular season that was suspended March 12 and have a lineup laced with players who have won multiple Stanley Cups.
No less an authority that Shea Weber, anchor of the Canadiens' defense corps, agrees that it's perfectly logical for his club to be an underdog in that series.
"I've got no problem with that," he told reporters after a scrimmage Saturday. "We can be underdogs all day ... Nobody should take offense with that."
The Canadiens' prospects for pulling off an upset got a boost this week when Max Domi, a Type 1 diabetic, decided to join his teammates for the postseason despite the additional dangers that contracting the coronavirus could pose for him.
Montreal coach Claude Julien has been using him between wingers Jordan Weal and Dale Weise, and said he is pleased with how those three have performed.
"People may be pleasantly surprised at what they can bring in games," he said.
Here are the other personnel combinations Julien used during a scrimmage Saturday:
FORWARDS
Tomas Tatar -- Phillip Danault -- Brendan Gallagher
Jonathan Drouin -- Nick Suzuki -- Joel Armia
Artturi Lehkonen -- Jesperi Kotkaniemi -- Paul Byron
Ryan Poehling -- Jake Evans -- Alex Belzile
Laurent Dauphin, Charles Hudon
DEFENSEMEN
Ben Chiarot -- Shea Weber
Brett Kulak -- Jeff Petry
Xavier Ouellet -- Victor Mete
Gustav Olofsson -- Cale Fleury
Josh Brook -- Noah Juulsen
GOALIES
Carey Price
Charlie Lindgren
Michael McNiven
Cayden Primeau
