So, who was the home team here? The Habs or the Habs Not? The guys in Black and Gold, who'd been out of town for so long that they still had leftover turkey in the fridge? Or the Canadiens, who've gotten so comfy on Causeway Street that they may as well install brass nameplates in the visitors' dressing room?
Montreal gave Boston a rude welcome home at the Garden last night, rolling up a 3-0 lead in the first 19 minutes and hanging a 4-2 defeat on the road-weary Bruins before 14,977 deflated witnesses.
"I don't know what it is," said Phil Kessel, whose mates have dropped seven straight to the Canadiens and six of the last eight here. "Right now, we've been struggling against them."
Right now, after nearly a fortnight on the road with more to come, the Bruins are struggling generally, dropping three of their last four, including Wednesday's killer overtime loss at New Jersey with a squandered three-goal lead. They're without their top two goalies, without a couple of regular defensemen, without last season's No. 2 scorer.
They're dizzy from hopscotching airports and leg-weary from five games in eight nights, with three more road shows coming up. "There's definitely mental fatigue and there's definitely physical fatigue," acknowledged coach Claude Julien, whose men had one good period in them last night.
It came after Montreal already had gotten goals from Christopher Higgins (3:03, on the power play), Kyle Chipchura (13:40), and Tomas Plekanec (18:18) to dump Boston into a monster pothole.
"Everyone saw what happened," said rookie goalie Tuukka Rask, who got the starting nod after Tim Thomas strained his groin late in Wednesday's game. "Three-nothing in the first period, it's hard to bounce back from that."
The Canadiens had been playing poorly (three wins in 10 games), but they came out on the jump and put the Bruins on their backs. "That was not good at all," said P.J. Axelsson. "They came out flying and we came out flat."
The goals came far too easily against a Boston club that had given up only 10 first-period scores all season. The first was off an open shot by Roman Hamrlik from the left faceoff circle that produced a fat rebound for Higgins, who poked it in from the doorstep for his 12th goal.
The second literally was a walk in the Gahden for the rookie Chipchura, who strolled between the circles and fired a wrister past Rask, who might as well have been an arcade duck. Then Plekanec came storming down the right wing and wristed one to the far corner.
Taken with the four that New Jersey scored after being down, 3-0, that was seven straight goals scored against the Bruins in three periods. But just as the Devils crawled out of the crater, Boston started committing to some hockey in the second period and clawed their way back into it.
When Andrei Kostitsyn was whistled for hooking, the Bruins struck promptly on the power play, with Zdeno Chara passing from right point to left, from where Dennis Wideman launched a rocket that Kessel (nine goals) tipped past goalie Carey Price at 6:10. Then Marc Savard (who extended his career-best, league-leading point streak to 12 games) made a nifty pass from behind the goal line to Axelsson, who converted from the front parlor.
"It was like night and day," mused Chara. "We were flat in the first period and we dominated in the second. But it wasn't good enough. We have to bring it for 60 minutes."
Twenty a night doesn't do it in any building, especially for a club that now is 1-7 when it gives up the first goal. If they'd cashed their final power play at the start of the third period, the Bruins might have pulled it out, but they didn't manage a shot.
As the clock ticked down, the Canadiens, who've lost only once in regulation when leading after the first period, began reasserting themselves. They delivered a tricolored coup de grace with 6:45 to play, with Higgins slipping the puck across to Mathieu Dandenault at the top of the slot for a backhand flip.
So it went the way it usually does when Montreal drops by for chowdah. "Maybe we should play more games against them," suggested coach Guy Carbonneau, whose men will be back next month.
The Bruins, meanwhile, are stuffing extra underwear into their travel bag this afternoon and heading for Toronto, Buffalo, and Atlanta. Maybe they can sublease the building to the Habs in the interim. The Canadian dollar is stronger than it's been in years.
John Powers can be reached at jpowers@globe.com.
