Patrick Roy is arguably one of my favorite netminders in league history, since he was one of the most dominant goaltenders of the era when I was growing up. But on December 2nd, 1995, Roy had one of the worst games of his career against a red-hot Detroit Red Wings team that skated into the Montreal Forum and wreaked havoc.
What ended up happening was the worst defeat to date in Canadiens franchise history, while the Red Wings put up a touchdown, a two-point conversion, and a field goal on the Habs. Hey, I had a friend who once said that there needs to be a mercy rule in hockey once a team scores 10 goals, and Roy probably would've lowered that number one notch to nine.
Why? Because he gave up nine goals that night, with five of them coming in the first period. Just over three minutes into the game, and after a fight in the first 30 seconds between Darren McCarty and Turner Stevenson to warm the crowd up, Igor Larionov struck first on a power play goal.
It only got worse for the Habs from there. For the most part, anyway, as Vvacheslav Kozlov scored, before the Canadiens Mark Recchi made it 2-1. Then came the onslaught, with Kozlov scoring again. After that, Nicklas Lidstrom and Greg Johnson scored on the man advantage at the 18:04 and 19:01 marks to close out the period.
Red Wings relentless onslaught of the Canadiens continued in the second period
Just under three minutes into the second frame, Kozlov yielded a hat trick, before Mathieu Dandenault made it 7-1. Greg Johnson scored just over the halfway point of the second to make it 8-1, before Sergei Fedorov buried one less than two minutes later to make it 9-1.
At that point, the Habs benched Roy, who finished the game with 17 saves on 26 shots, good for a meager 0.654 save percentage in just 31:57 of time in the crease. Pat Jablonski came in to finish the game, allowing an additional two goals on 15 shots from Kozlov, who had his fourth of the night, and Dandenault, who snagged his second.
Overall, it was a night to forget for Roy, who supposedly demanded a trade during the contest. And, spoiler alert, Roy got his wish four days later, when the Habs sent him to Denver. To rub some salt in the Habs wound, Roy ended up winning the Stanley Cup with the Avalanche.
And that's when this story also took an unfortunate turn for the Red Wings. They faced Roy in the Western Conference Final that season and couldn't upend him when the stakes were at their highest. Still, their legendary showing against Roy in December 1995 proved they could beat him.
And beat him they did, one year later in 1997, when they took the Western Conference title that year against Roy's Avalanche and won the Cup.
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