By: Tom Calautti | @TCalauttis
The Boston Bruins returned to TD Garden for the second half of a back-to-back after a disappointing loss to the New York Rangers. The Black and Gold blew another one-goal lead but rallied in overtime to defeat the Nashville Predators 3-2. Here’s how it unfolded:
Travel Issues
Playing a back-to-back with this season’s condensed NHL schedule is never ideal. That scenario becomes even less ideal when playing just hours after a blizzard.
Despite this difficult backdrop, the Bruins gutted out a win despite major travel adversity. According to Morgan Geekie (one of Boston’s three goal-scorers in last night’s contest), it wasn’t until 1:30 in the afternoon that the Bruins arrived home from the airport.
Luckily for Geekie and his teammates, the chefs and a particular member of the coaching staff were ready to make sure things went smoothly.
“(John McLean), our skills coach, was nice enough to go and shovel everybody’s car off so we could get home,” said Geekie following the victory. “So we owe him a couple of beers. And then our chefs came out to the airport as well to give us some pregame meals. So like I said, it takes a village, and everybody stepped up today, no matter how bad (the weather) was. And happy we could get to win.
Thanks to their chefs and Coach McLean, the Bruins arrived at TD Garden ready to avenge their previous loss.
Lindholm to the Olympics
Arguably, the biggest story from yesterday was the announcement that defenseman Hampus Lindholm would be joining Team Sweden for the 2026 Olympics. Lindholm will fill in for the Swedes after it was announced that Minnesota Wild defenseman Joonas Brodin will miss the tournament due to injury.
“The coach (of Team Sweden) called me before the Rangers game,” said Lindholm about when he learned the good news. “So it was a nice phone call to get.”
The 32-year-old defender reflected on how difficult a journey it’s been coming back from last year’s injury, and spoke about just how sweet it is to receive this honor.
“Obviously, it’s been so nice to bounce back this year,” said Lindholm. “I had put in a lot of work in the summer to get back to the level that I hold myself to. And like I said, so fun, a great honor, and just excited.”
Lindholm was able to channel that excitement directly into last night’s contest as he opened the scoring at the 13:16 mark of the first period. Fraser Minten won an offensive zone draw, and Mason Lohrei tossed the puck over to Lindholm, who tossed a wrister on net that deflected past Predators’ goaltender Jusse Saaros to give Boston a 1-0 lead.
It was a great day to be Hampus Lindholm, and a well-deserved honor for someone who’s been through so much over the past two seasons.
Gutting Out a Win
After Lindholm’s goal, things seemed to be trending in the right direction for the Bruins. They went to the locker room up one after the first and were able to increase their lead when Morgan Geekie lasered a wrister past Saros to make the game 2-0.
But after that, bad habits began to creep back into Boston’s game.
Penalty trouble led to Nashville’s first goal, and given the situation and the time in the game, it couldn’t have come at a worse time. David Pastrnak was assessed a minor for slashing Predators’ captain Roman Josi, and the Swiss defenseman made him pay by cutting the lead in half with just 35 seconds remaining in the second frame.
Then the Bruins made the same mistake they did the previous night at Madison Square Garden: playing prevent defense in the third period.
The Predators started the final frame with a little extra jump, and Boston did well to weather the storm until Nick Blankenburg beat Jeremy Swayman during a four-on-four to tie the game with 6:43 remaining.
Just like the night before, Boston let another regulation victory slip through their hands and were headed to overtime.
But this time around, things were different. Just 15 seconds into the extra frame, Pastrnak tapped in a Charlie McAvoy feed to give Boston the victory.
With the win, the Bruins are tied with Montreal for the top wild-card spot and are six points ahead of the Florida Panthers for the second spot. They’ll return to TD Garden on Thursday to take on the Philadelphia Flyers for the last game before Sunday’s Stadium Series in Tampa Bay.
Game Notes
- Elias Lindholm went down after a neutral zone faceoff late in the second period and struggled getting off the ice. He didn’t return in the third. Marco Sturm had no update postgame and said we’d know more today.
- Pastrnak has 2-8-10 in his last five games and 3-17-20 in his last ten.
- Since going pointless in five-straight, Morgan Geekie has 5-4-9 in his last seven games.
- With an assist on the Lindholm goal Minten now has 7-6-13 in his last 14 games.
- One crazy sequence during the game came when a fan sitting up against the glass was struck with an errant puck. Ryan O’Reilly of the Predators immediately got a towel and tossed it over the glass to the fan. He got stitched up and received a loud ovation as he returned to his seat.
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