Boston's four-game winning streak was supposed to restore lustre to its storied rivalry with Montreal on Monday night, but it meant absolutely nothing to the host Canadiens. 

Alex Kovalev and Saku Koivu had two points apiece as the Canadiens clobbered the Bruins 6-1 before a capacity crowd of 21,273 at the Bell Centre. 

Christopher Higgins scores on Manny Fernandez in Monday's 6-1 triumph.
(Paul Chiasson/Canadian Press)

Christopher Higgins, Kovalev, Steve Begin, Patrice Brisebois, rookie Mikhail Grabovski and Andrei Markov scored the goals for the Canadiens (4-2-2), who have won 13 of the last 17 meetings between the Original Six rivals.

"Speed was the key word tonight," Begin said. "We played a great 60 minutes."

"That is fun," Canadiens head coach Guy Carbonneau said of the scoring spree.

"It gets everybody into the game. We always talk about the top two lines, who are there to score and play the power play, but the third and fourth lines like to show what they can do, too."

Cristobal Huet finished with 30 saves, meaning he has stopped 114 of 120 shots over his past four home games.

"We took some quality shots from the outside — some good first shots — but we didn't get to the rebounds and we didn't get in Huet's face," Bruins defenceman Andrew Ference said.

Koivu and Tomas Plekanec each had two assists, while Bryan Smolinski earned one assist in his 1,000th NHL game.

Canadiens defenceman Roman Hamrlik reached the 1,000-game milestone in the season opener, while Kovalev will do so on Friday.

"My first game was my biggest highlight," Smolinski said, referring to his NHL debut with Boston on March 27, 1993.

"The coolest thing was walking through the crowd in the old Boston Garden. You had to be humbled by it."

Dennis Wideman scored a power-play goal for the Bruins (5-3-0), losers in eight of their last nine visits to Montreal.

Manny Fernandez managed just 12 saves in defeat.

"I don't think we handed it to them, but we didn't give them a bruiser game, either," Ference said.

"We are stronger on the puck in the offensive zone," Carbonneau noted. "We make the defencemen work and, when they are tired, they make mistakes."

Higgins sparks Habs

Higgins opened the scoring with his third goal of the season just 12:14 into the contest, burying a rebound after Koivu won a faceoff back to Mike Komisarek for the initial shot.

Kovalev's fourth off a faceoff upped it to 2-0 at 6:28 of the second period, and Montreal went ahead 3-0 when Tom Kostopoulos deked around a sliding Aaron Ward and set up Begin for his first with 2:12 left. 

Brisebois then finished off a pretty three-way passing play involving Plekanec and Kovalev for his first, a power-play effort 1:45 into the third period.

After Wideman spoiled Huet's shutout bid with his first on a wrist shot through traffic at the 6:41 mark, Grabovski converted Smolinski's pass on a 2-on-1 break for his first NHL goal at 9:34.

"He is great on the wing," Carbonneau said of Grabovski.

"He can use his speed. He doesn't have to worry about coming back in his zone and spending a lot of time defending."

Markov roofed his third on the short side to complete the carnage with 7:21 remaining.

With files from the Canadian Press