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A brand-new experience for the Montreal Canadiens is old hat for the New York Islanders.

The Canadiens and Islanders will play what amounts to an early playoff game Thursday night, when Montreal visits New York in a battle of Eastern Conference wild-card contenders.

Both teams were off Wednesday after earning pivotal wins with third-period comebacks Tuesday night. The host Canadiens had scored five times in the third to beat the Ottawa Senators 6-3, while the visiting Islanders scored four unanswered goals to defeat the Pittsburgh Penguins 4-2.

The wins by the Canadiens (33-27-7, 73 points) and Islanders (31-28-8, 70 points) were part of a best-case scenario evening for both clubs.

Their wins, coupled with the New York Rangers’ 2-1 loss to the Calgary Flames, allowed the Canadiens to vault past the Rangers into the second wild-card spot and pulled the Islanders within two points of their Big Apple rival.

Both teams have two games in hand on the Rangers.

Montreal hasn’t made the playoffs since 2021, when it reached the Stanley Cup Finals despite finishing with the fewest points of any qualifier during the pandemic-shortened 56-game regular season. Montreal hasn’t made the playoffs in a full 82-game campaign since 2016-17.

The Canadiens, who trailed 2-1 entering the third and 3-2 after the Senators’ Travis Hamonic scored at the 6:13 mark, collected four goals in the final 9:38 to improve to 8-1-2 since they returned from the 4 Nations Face-Off. Nick Suzuki scored the game-winner with 4:37 remaining before Josh Anderson and Brendan Gallagher added empty-netters.

Montreal entered the break six points behind the Detroit Red Wings in the race for the second wild-card spot.

“This was our biggest win of the season, for sure,” Suzuki said. “And the next one’s going to be the biggest one. We’re in playoff mode right now. We can’t afford losses and giving up points.”

Playoff mode at this time of the year is nothing new for the Islanders, who are tied with the Red Wings and Columbus Blue Jackets behind the Rangers but have one game in hand on Detroit and two more regulation wins than the Blue Jackets.

The Islanders, who also overcame a two-goal third-period deficit in Sunday’s 4-2 win over the defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers, are trying to ride a late-season surge into the playoffs for the third straight season. New York earned a wild-card berth by going 14-7-2 down the stretch in 2022-23 and finished in third place in the Metropolitan Division after winning eight of its final nine games (8-0-1) last year.

“Every season is different, but we have found ourselves the last couple of years in this situation,” said Islanders defenseman Noah Dobson, who scored the game-winning goal Sunday and tied the score at 5:34 of the third Tuesday — about eight minutes before Pierre Engvall snapped the tie with Pittsburgh.

“It’s a veteran group in here. We know what it takes at this time of the year. It’s not always going to be pretty. But you’ve just got to find a way and dig deep.”

–Field Level Media