MONTREAL — The Montreal Canadiens return to the Bell Centre and the most electric playoff atmosphere in hockey for Game 3 of the Eastern Conference final against the Carolina Hurricanes with a burden, despite gaining a road split to open the series and now holding home-ice advantage.

The burden is that the Canadiens have not used that home ice and that electric playoff atmosphere to their advantage, holding a 2-4 record in the playoffs at the Bell Centre — something they are looking to change in Game 3 on Monday night.

Captain Nick Suzuki spoke after an 8-3 loss in Game 6 against the Buffalo Sabres in the second round about how the special atmosphere in the building forces his young team into trying to do too much, getting away from the simplicity of their game that more often leads to success in the playoffs.

But perhaps that is the wrong statistical benchmark to lean on here.

The Canadiens are coming off a loss in Game 2 to Carolina, a loss that could have very easily been a win, but a loss nonetheless. Since the start of the playoffs, and even a month longer than that, the Canadiens have yet to lose consecutive games.

And a big reason for that is rookie goalie Jakub Dobeš.

When Suzuki was talking about the Canadiens’ difficulties on home ice, he referred to how playing in that environment takes getting used to and that the young Canadiens are still learning how to manage that incredible energy and resist the temptation to do too much.

Well, for a goalie, performing after a loss is also supposed to take getting used to. It’s also supposed to require experience. And yet Dobeš is getting it done at a historic rate.

Since the advent of the salary cap in 2005, only two rookie goalies have played as many playoff games in a single year as Dobeš’ 16 this season without suffering consecutive losses this deep into the playoffs.

The first of those goalies was Cam Ward in 2006, who came into a first-round series against the Canadiens and eliminated them en route to winning the Stanley Cup with current Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour as captain. Ward did lose consecutive games in that playoff run, but they didn’t come until his 21st and 22nd starts of the playoffs, games 5 and 6 of the Stanley Cup Final, before winning Game 7.

The other was Matt Murray, who led the Pittsburgh Penguins to the 2016 Stanley Cup without once losing consecutive games in his first 21 career playoff starts.

The next is Dobeš.

End of list.

Dobeš was typically hard on himself after the overtime loss to Carolina in Game 2, feeling he should have had that shot by Nikolaj Ehlers.

“When you go to OT, you try to give the team as much of a chance as possible, and obviously, the first chance they got, they scored,” Dobeš said after the game. “I just wish I could help the guys a little longer, but (the series is) 1-1, we’re going back (home), so I think we’re in a pretty good spot.”

The main reason the Canadiens are in a good spot is undoubtedly Dobeš. He already has two Game 7 wins under his belt in these playoffs, one of them in overtime, and he is giving similar vibes to Ward and Murray as rookies on their way to the Stanley Cup.

Dobeš is uniquely weird. His teammates love him for it. But Dobeš is also uniquely wired to win, to improve and to compete.

It goes back to when he was 16 and did not have a team in his native Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, willing to give him a shot, forcing him to take an opportunity in St. Louis and run with it. Had that opportunity to play for the U18 AAA Blues not worked out, Dobeš might not have continued playing high-level hockey. He might have gone back home and looked for other ways to continue his education.

But even back then, his U18 coach saw this willingness to battle in Dobeš.

“It’s a process that people don’t understand, and once you understand it and you own it and you go through those ups and downs, he was very focused. Every time he had a bad game, the next day he wanted work. Like at 6 a.m., he wanted to go back and just work right away,” his coach in St. Louis, former NHLer Lubos Bartečko, told us last year shortly after Dobeš made his NHL debut. “I told my wife when he got drafted by the Canadiens that I wouldn’t be surprised if, once he gets the chance, he will take it. Because I knew that’s what he did in youth. And you can’t teach that. It happened in AAA, it happened in junior, it happened in college (at Ohio State), and now it’s happening in the NHL.

“I told my wife, when they give him the opportunity, he’s going to absolutely take it, and he’s going to be good.”

Dobeš’ entire career has been a battle from the very start. He was not taken in his first year of eligibility for the USHL draft, so he went back to work in St. Louis and was drafted the next year, earning a scholarship to Ohio State and getting drafted as a flier by the Canadiens in the fifth round of the 2020 NHL Draft.

He did not make the Canadiens out of training camp last year and went back to AHL Laval hell-bent on proving he belonged in the NHL.

“When I was in Laval, I wanted to be here,” Dobeš said after his fourth career NHL start (and fourth career NHL win) in Dallas last year. “The one thing is I want to prove that I belong here, and the second thing is I kind of want to show everyone they made the right choice. There were a lot of days in Laval where I wanted to be here, so it was kind of a motivation to show everyone that maybe they were wrong.”

That quote came after Dobeš played 65 AHL games, hardly an eternity, and hardly unreasonable as a stint in the minors to get acclimated to professional hockey. But Dobeš never saw it that way. He was determined to make the NHL because he is a competitor.

And it is that competitiveness that has allowed Dobeš to respond to all six losses he has faced so far in these playoffs with a win. He will have another opportunity to do it Monday night in Montreal, in front of fans who have embraced him like so many young goalies before him: Carey Price, Jaroslav Halak, Jose Theodore, Patrick Roy.

What Dobeš is doing in these playoffs has put him in that group. And though the Canadiens and Dobeš himself have things they want and need to correct on home ice, there is something special in Dobeš’ ability to come back from a loss and win.

He is eager to add a seventh win after a loss to his long list these playoffs, a win that would pass the number Ward and Murray put up after a loss in their rookie Stanley Cup runs.

“It’s hard to describe,” Dobeš said of playing at the Bell Centre in the playoffs. “It doesn’t feel real, but it’s great. Every time we step on the ice it’s a privilege, and we need to be better at home. We talk about it, and we’ll try our best.”