By: Tom Calautti | @TCalauttis
The Boston Bruins returned to TD Garden ice to take on Bruce Cassidy and the Vegas Golden Knights. The Black and Gold were eager to bounce back after their lackluster effort against Dallas, and eventually skated to a 4-3 victory against the Pacific Division’s top team. Here’s how it went down:
No Dallas Hangover
The Bruins played one of their worst games of the season Tuesday night in Dallas. You know it, I know it, and thankfully, the team knew it. They completely flipped the script in Thursday night’s tilt against Vegas, charging out to a three-goal lead after the first frame.
The party got started just over nine minutes into the first when Golden Knights center Tomas Hertl high-sticked Alex Steeves, giving the Black and Gold a four-minute power-play. It took the Boston man advantage just 11 seconds to make Vegas pay when Charlie McAvoy blasted a one-timer past Akira Schmid to give the Bruins a 1-0 lead.
After McAvoy’s goal, the Bruins still had another two minutes of power-play time, and they made it count. A pretty cross-ice passing play between Morgan Geekie and Pastrnak stretched the penalty killers and opened up some space in the slot. Pastrnak feathered a pass to Elias Lindholm, who one-timed a snap shot that beat Schmid.
“Great start. You know, we talk about bouncing back and have a good start, get the crowd into it,” said Pastrnak following the victory. “And you know, today, lucky enough, the good start and good 40 minutes were enough to win the game.
The fourth line got in on the action a mere 24 seconds later when Tanner Jeannot gathered a Sean Kuraly pass at the top of the left circle, carried it down the wing, and sniped a puck over Schmid’s shoulder to increase the lead to 3-0. The Bruins clearly took the Dallas game personally and came out on a mission to make a statement against Vegas.
“None of us were happy about that game and effort in Dallas, and we knew coming home we wanted to answer for that,” said Jeannot. “So we came out strong, and like I said, we bent, but we didn’t break at the end there, and we came out with two points, so it’s good.”
Korpisalo Stays Consistent
Joonas Korpisalo is reshaping the narrative around his second season in Boston. After a rough start and significant bench time, the Finnish netminder has quietly strung together solid performances.
Last night’s victory marked the fifth straight start where Korpisalo has allowed three goals or fewer. In those contests, he’s 4-1 with a .940 save percentage and 1.80 goals against.
The Bruins didn’t surrender many chances in the first period, but their goalie made some key saves early on to keep the score knotted at zero. Perhaps the save of the game came around five minutes in when Korpisalo made a strong right-to-left push to stone Vegas’ Ivan Barbashev on a back-post attempt.
“(Korpisalo) was excellent again tonight,” said Sturm of his goaltender. “(He’s been excellent) for the last I don’t know how many starts.”
The Golden Knights made their push in the third period, landing 22 shots on goal and potting three goals during the last frame. But when the chips were down and the Bruins needed him most, Korpisalo stood strong and kept Vegas from dragging this game to overtime.
Despite the late push, Sturm said he was confident in his team’s ability to pull out a victory, especially given the way his goaltender has been playing.
“I was really calm (in the third), because (Korpisalo) has that presence right now, the confidence in his game that he’s going to make those big save spots.”
Bend But Don’t Break
Multiple players and Sturm acknowledged that Boston played maybe its best 40 minutes of the season in last night’s contest. Unfortunately for them, Vegas refused to go away quietly.
The Bruins would extend their lead to 4-0 a little under halfway through the second when Nikita Zadorov flattened Tomas Hertl on a reverse hit, then found Pastrnak for his 21st of the season. They finished the second frame with a large lead and a solid grip on the contest, but they almost let it slip away.
The Golden Knights came out flying in the third period. Jack Eichel and Hertl scored less than three minutes apart, and Vegas almost immediately cut the lead in half. Things got even more interesting when Pavel Dorofyev snuck a bad-angle shot through Korpisalo’s legs to make the score 4-3 with 2:35 remaining.
The team was able to batten down the hatches and keep Vegas from sending the game to overtime, thanks to some last-minute saves from Korpisalo and a Herculean shot block from Charlie McAvoy.
“I think we would have liked a little bit better third period tonight,” said Jeannot. “But yeah, like you said, we put ourselves in that position, and we bent, but we didn’t break, and we came up with two points.”
It may not have been pretty, but the Bruins got back in the win column after one of their ugliest losses of the season. They have sole possession of the East Conference’s second wild card spot and are just one point back of Montreal for third place in the Atlantic.
The Bruins get back to action on Saturday when the Habs come to town in what could very well be a game with major playoff implications.
Game Notes:
- With the opening goal, Charlie McAvoy has points in nine of his last 11 games with a total of 11 during that stretch.
- All three of Pastrnak, Geekie, and Elias Lindholm had multi-point games.
- The Bruins scored three goals in 54 seconds in the first period. in the team’s history that’s only the 13th fastest set of three goals. Pretty crazy stat
- It would’ve been nice to see the TD Garden faithful react to Rasmus Andersson after the Bruins weren’t able to land him in a trade. Unfortunately he hasn’t suited up for Vegas yet due to visa issues.
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