Bruins Shut Out Panthers; Snap Losing Streak

Today the Boston Bruins took to the ice against the Florida Panthers with one thing in mind: picking up a win. As the season comes to a close, the Bruins have been less than stellar lately. Whether it be because of emotion or injury, it was time for the B’s to get back on track. Today they looked to end their four-game losing streak while the Panthers are looking to preventing losing four of four on their roadtrip.  Tuukka Rask would start his second game in two days opposite the Panthers Jacob Markstrom. 

Nathan Horton and Adam McQuaid would both be out of lineup with injuries, meaning Milan Lucic and Dougie Hamilton would make their way back in.

Rask earned the shutout today! (Credit: Flickr/Slidingsideways)

It took only 3 minutes and 3 seconds into the first period for the Bruins to get the first goal of the game. Jaromir Jagr would score his second goal as a Bruin with Chris Kelly and Carl Soderberg getting the assists. Jagr has two goals and six assists in just nine games with the black and gold. And lets not forget that Soderbergs assist was his NHL point. I have a feeling that’s the first of many. That would be the lone goal of the first period but it was clear that the B’s knew they needed to come out of this game with two points. Also, I would like to point out that Rask was playing yet another solid game stopping all seven shots on net.

Second period came around with the B’s fighting off the remainder of a Rich Peverley slashing penalty. Florida would be unable to get any goals past Rask and we would be back to an even game. The Bruins would get a chance to go on the power play and though they wouldn’t register any goals, they did get many shots on net. 8 minutes into the second the B’s were outshooting the Panthers 10-1. With 6:27 left in the period Dougie Hamilton would score his fifth of the season with a drive from the right point that was a thing of beauty. That goal would not have happened without Shawn Thornton on the assist keeping that puck in the offensive zone the entire time.

Coming into the third it should be noted that the B’s are 14-2-2 with a two-goal lead going into the final period. With 1:22 remaining in the game, the Bruins sealed the win with an empty net goal from Brad Marchand assisted by his lineys Tyler Seguin and Patrice Bergeron. Marchand leads the team with 18 goals. And with that the Bruins snap their losing streak. Rask earned his 15th career shutout with 28 saves today.

The three stars of the game are 1. Rask, 2. Jagr, 3. Hamilton.

After the game the Bruins took part in their annual “shirts of their back” ceremony. The jerseys usually go to season ticket holders. Hower with recent events, the ticket holders opted for their jerseys to go to first responders that helped during the Marathon bombings and all of the events that took place in Boston this past week. This ceremony was truly inspiring and is further reason why I love my Boston Bruins!

B’s are back in action Tuesday night in Philly against the Flyers.

 

Bruins Look to Bounce Back Against Panthers

So Tuesday game in the end sucked, and there’s really no way around it. But the Boston Bruins are back at home looking to pick up the pieces from that debacle and grab a win against the Florida Panthers. This is the second of three match ups between the teams and the first one at the T.D Garden. The last game between the B’s and the Panthers was February 24th with the Bruins taking a 4-1 win.

Can Seguin continue his point streak? (Credit:Flickr/Slidingsideways)

That last game if you recall featured this beauty:

That same game the Bruins played a full 60 minute game and if they want to pick up a win they’re going to have to do just that.

Eastern Conference Contention:
Quite frankly the Bruins need this win to stay on pace with the Eastern Conference leading Montreal Canadiens. The Florida Panthers on the other hand have lost two straight and are in last place in the conference. A win for either team could be the momentum they need to get back on track. While the Bruins have played 24 games and are halfway through with the season, the Panthers have played 27 meaning they have less chances to gain points.

Banged-up Panthers:
The losses that have piled up for Florida haven’t come without many injuries to key players. The Panthers’ Kris Versteeg is sidelined once again after coming back from injury. He sustained a lower body injury Tuesday night. The injury list for the rest of the team includes defenseman Michael Caruso (wrist), Ed Jovanovski (knee), Mike Weaver (lower body) and Dmitry Kulikov (wrist), forwards Scottie Upshall (lower body),Stephen Weiss (wrist) and Sean Bergenheim (undisclosed), and goalie Jose Theodore (groin). Basically they’re many guys short. But the rest of the team is coming to Boston ready to battle so I wouldn’t count them out just yet.

Rask Rules:
Look for Tuukka Rask to be in net tonight against Florida’s Jacob Markstrom. Rask is currently second in goaltending wins one behind Montreal’s Carey Price. He is also among the top 5 goaltenders of the league with a 1.96 goals against average and .927 save percentage, ranking fourth in both categories.

Who’s hot:
For the Bruins it’s Tyler Seguin. Seguin has four goals in four games and seems to finally have gotten into his groove for this season. On the Panthers end, it’s forward  Tomas Kopecky. He has points in three straight and goals in two in a row.

Puck drops tonight at 7 and you can watch the game on NESN!

Boston Bruins On the Prowl

Brad Marchand got the ball rolling for Boston, scoring the first goal of the game short-handed. (Photo Credit: Steph Phillips)

This afternoon the Boston Bruins are playing in their third road game of their five-game stint against the Florida Panthers. They are coming off of a 4-2 win against the Tampa Bay Lightning where Nathan Horton struck Benny and the Bolts with the opening and closing goals.

The Bruins are coming off of their last two-day break before heading into today’s game and playing every other day for the rest of the season.  They currently hold a 10-2-2 record and sit third in the Northeast Division and sixth in the Eastern Conference, playing the fewest amount of games thus far than any other teams in the Conference. The Panthers are currently 5-8-4 on the season coming off of a 3-1 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins Friday evening.

The Bruins currently hold a 6-1-1 record while playing on the road this season and have killed their last 17 penalties with perfection, earning them the best penalty killing advantage in the League at 94.4%.  While their power play is still struggling to improve at a mere 13%, the Panthers don’t provide much more success registering only 17.4%.

Who’s Hot..

• Brad Marchand helped lead the Bruins to the 4-2 victory against the Lightning when he scored his ninth goal of the season to regain the lead for Boston. Marchand currently leads the Bruins squad pacing them with 9 goals this season in just 13 games.
• Dougie Hamilton posted a pair of helpers in Thursday night’s game against the Lightning for his 7th and 8th helpers of the season.
• David Krejci is currently the Bruins points leader with 4 goals and 8 assists in 14 games this season playing a pivotal role for the bruins squad.

Anton Khudobin could potentially see some time between the pipes tonight to preserve Tuukka for the stretch of games to come, but no official word has been stated. Khudobin is 2-1-0 on the season and holds a .905 save percentage and 2.70 goals against average.

Today’s game is scheduled for 3:00pm EST and can be seen on New England Sports Network with commentary from Jack Edwards and Andy Brickley ro heard on 98.5 the Sports Hub.  If you want to catch the game on line, check here.

Holding on by a Point

The Bruins need to find their focus ASAP (Credit: Slidingsideways/Flickr)

Last night was the fourth loss in a row for the Boston Bruins who are now 1 point ahead of the Ottawa Senators in the Northeast division. The team they lost too in a 6-2 game, the Florida Panthers, are now 2 points below them in the Eastern conference. The Bruins are frustrated,  injured, and tired but those are excuses. Teams have slumps sure, but this slump has been going on since January. Last night was no exception. It was once again a game that started with the other team scoring the first two goals of the game. In the past two games, the other team has scored 12 goals to the Bruins scoring 3. It seems to be a repeating trend of the opposing team turning up the energy while the B’s sit back and let it happen.

“It was basically a whole team collapse tonight,” said Julien in a sentence that could sum up the last two months. “We do have some guys that are tired, and we have some guys that aren’t playing up to par. We’ve got lots of games and we have to fight our way through it. You can’t throw your arms up in the air. You’ve got to fight through it.”(Via CSNNE)

So what needs to change in order for the team to get back on track? Well for starters WHERE IS OUR DEFENSE? There is only so much of the blame that can be put on the lack luster goal tending but if our D was doing it’s job the other team shouldn’t have as many shots on net. The energy on this team is just not there. The physicality on the team is just not there. Everyone should be getting shots on net, not just one line of players. At this point, watching the games feels like I’m watching a completely different team.

I do have one positive and that is that the lone two goals last night came from Joe Corvo and Brian Rolston, yeah you read that right. Those names are usually ones that are referenced with goal scoring but it’s good to see some people attempting to pick up the slack.

Tomorrow the Bruins face off against the Philadelphia Flyers in a game that I am hoping will not be a fifth straight loss. The day off today I hope is serving the team well. B’s fans I guess all we can do right now is pray that Ottawa and Florida find themselves in slumps…