The Montreal Canadiens have had little difficulty shutting down the NHL's No. 1 power play. But that was the only area they continued to thrive in against the Washington Capitals on Monday.

The Canadiens conceded four unanswered goals in the second period en route to a 5-1 thrashing by the Capitals at the Bell Centre. Washington has a 2-1 series lead, even though the Caps have yet to score a goal in 13 man-advantage situations in three games — 14 if you count a brief three-second power-play in the third period.

"Yeah, we suck right now," said Capitals coach Bruce Boudreau, when asked about his club being shutout on the power play. "Eventually we'll get a power-play goal. Maybe not this series. Maybe next year."

More important to Boudreau and his players was dealing with fanatical denizens of the Bell Centre. As they always do, the Canadiens supporters heightened their passion before the game and throughout the opening 20 minutes.

But the Canadiens could not take advantage of the supportive surroundings. They enjoyed two glorious scoring chances in the opening period, but Capitals goalie Semyon Varlamov answered the call.

"Our goal was to come out of the first period even," Boudreau said. "It was a crazy crowd … crazy good. I don't want to be misquoted. It was loud and there was lots of energy, a tremendous buzz."

A buzz that was lowered several decibels when Boyd Gordon scored his first career NHL playoff goal with the Canadiens on the power play early in the second period.

It was hardly Jaroslav Halak's fault because Montreal defenceman Jaroslav Spacek bumped into him when the latter stretched out to take away a possible pass from Gordon. Spacek took his goalie out of the play and allowed Gordon to bang in his own rebound.

But then Halak surrendered goals to Brooks Laich and Eric Fehr off sloppy turnovers by his teammates and his evening was finished after allowing three goals on six shots in the period.

His replacement, Carey Price, gave up a goal to Alexander Ovechkin a few minutes later and another to Matt Bradley in the final minute of the game.

"We got off our game a little bit," Montreal forward Scott Gomez said. "That just shows you what a high-powered team they have."

'Need to choose my words more carefully'

The Canadiens' frustration with their own play shone through in the second period with the Capitals up by four.

Montreal forward Brian Gionta took a cross-checking penalty, followed by a Gomez 10-minute misconduct for mouthing off and shortly after Plekanec was called for interference and an unsportsmanlike penalty for questioning the referee's decision.

"I guess I need to choose my words more carefully," Gomez conceded.

The Canadiens' top line of Plekanec, Andrei Kostitsyn and Mike Cammalleri was on for four goals, including the shorthanded marker from Gordon.

"I've been saying all week that you can't just shut down Ovechkin because they have a lot of firepower over there," Cammalleri said. "What did they have, seven 20-goal scorers?"

A power-play goal for the third game in a row from Plekanec in the third period didn't do much to satisfy the vociferous appetite of the capacity Canadiens crowd of 21,273 for a playoff victory at home.

As only the Canadiens organization can do, there was a touch of ingenuity with their pre-game opening.

They had a youngster in a Rocket Richard sweater skate a lap around the ice surface with a torch to symbolize the part of the Flanders Field poem in the Montreal dressing room that reads, "To you from failing hands we pass the torch; be yours to hold it high."

Another welcome sight was Montreal legend Jean Beliveau back in his seat, looking healthy after his mild stroke this past winter.