VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Ticker) -- The Vancouver Canucks' home unbeaten mark was in jeopardy until the defense took over.
Ed Jovanovski scored twice in the third period and Mattias Ohlund tallied 3:02 into overtime as the Canucks remained one of two teams unbeaten at home this season with a 5-4 victory over the Montreal Canadiens.
Entering the game with the second-highest scoring defense corps in the NHL, Vancouver found itself in a hole when Richard Zednik scored goals 4:55 apart early in the second period. But defenseman Sami Salo halved the deficit with his third goal of the season and Brendan Morrison knotted the game with 3:06 left in the period.
Montreal's Andrei Markov snapped the tie 39 seconds into the third, but Jovanovski countered with tallies 4:01 apart, giving the Canucks a 4-3 advantage.
The lead was short-lived, as rookie Michael Ryder scored 51 seconds later off a feed by Canadiens captain Saku Koivu, who collected three assists. But in overtime, Ohlund received a pass from Todd Bertuzzi and wristed it by goaltender Jose Theodore from the right faceoff circle, running Vancouver's record at GM Place to 8-0-1.
"It's a key for us to get our defensemen joining the rush," Ohlund said. "We have guys with the ability to do it."
The goal was the 15th by a Vancouver defensemen and gave the group 47 points, two more than Colorado for first overall.
"We take it upon ourselves to contribute," Jovanovski said. "We can't put the whole load on our forwards to get the job done each and every night."
With a 7-0-2 record, Philadelphia also is unbeaten at home this season.
After scoring a career-high 31 goals last season, Zednik had just two in the first 18 contests. In this one, he put a wrist shot from the high slot through Dan Cloutier's pads 56 seconds into the second period to open the scoring. At 5:51, he converted a backhanded pass by Koivu from the left corner to double Montreal's lead.
"Getting down two goals to any team is a big deficit," Vancouver center Trevor Linden said. "We stuck to our game plan and we started scoring."
Salo and Morrison netted power-play goals later in the period to draw Vancouver even, but Markov snapped the tie early in the third with a slap shot from the left circle.
Heading to the net, Jovanovski had a shot by rookie Jason King deflect off him and by Theodore at 7:03 before slapping a shot from the right circle past the Canadiens goalie for his first multi-goal game of the season and third career.
"Eddie played unbelievable tonight," Ohlund said. "He has the ability to change the outlook of a game all by himself. He did that tonight with some nice plays."
Jovanovski's second tally was the Canucks' third on the power play and the ninth man-advantage goal allowed by Montreal in its last 27 shorthanded situations on the road.
"Bottom line is they wound up with twice the number of power plays that we did," said Montreal coach Claude Julien, whose team has lost its last five games in Vancouver. "It's kind of hard when you play a team with that much talent, and they took advantage of it."
