Bruins Subdue Hurricanes in ECF Game 1

Thursday night saw Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals between the Boston Bruins and the Carolina Hurricanes. It took Boston seven games in Round 1 to send the Toronto Maple Leafs packing and then six games in Round 2 to finish off the Columbus Blue Jackets. Meanwhile the Hurricanes had to go the distance with the Washington Capitals in Round 1 before moving on to sweep the New York Islanders in Round 2.

Despite the two goals scored—one for each team—in the first period, it seemed that both teams were a bit tentative and perhaps trying to get a feel for the other’s approach to the game. As has been seen too many times in the postseason for the Bruins, the second period was again not their strongest twenty minutes, and they ended up going into the second intermission down 2-1.

There has been much discussion as to the abilities of the Carolina Hurricanes during this post season and there is no doubt that they have a number of skilled players and that they are not afraid to take the body or get as physical as is necessary in each game. Some of their grittiness was on display Thursday night.

Carolina’s first goal, a deflection by Sebastian Aho while on the power play, happened three seconds into their power play after Sean Kuraly got sent off for a roughing. That evened things up and came a mere 47 seconds after the Bruins Steven Kampfer got Boston on the scoreboard first.

“We did a pretty good job. That’s kind of their sneaky line, they find each other a lot and they get lost on the side of the net. A lot of time it kind of looks like a nothing play, they just fold those pucks in there, and then they find each other and it’s an open chance,” said Bruins netminder Tuukka Rask.

No one thought it was going to be an easy game, and once again there were some frustrations with the refereeing, making it difficult for the players on both sides to truly understand what really constitutes a penalty. There were many things not called, but then some of what was whistled seemed to be either soft or questionable.

“There were penalties both ways I thought, some were called and not called so I mean there’s no point in getting into the officiating. I’m as frustrated as everybody on some of the calls but again I think we got to kill them.  We take a penalty, we have to kill them, and we didn’t do that,” said Carolina’s Head Coach Rod Brind’Amour

Carolina went up 2-1 during the second as foward Greg McKegg went hard to the net firing off a shot that beat Rask. McKegg was hauled down by Kampfer, who was trying to break up the play, just after the puck got through Rask, and that resulted in McKegg taking out Rask in the net. Fortunately for the Bruins, Rask was not injured. Despite having given up the two goals, he continued to be the Bruins best player.

Rask’s stinginess between the pipes kept Boston in the game during what could only be described as an uninspired second period for them. Kuraly took his second penalty of the game in that period. Meanwhile, the Bruins had a power play opportunity on which they couldn’t convert. As they went off during the second intermission, it was in large part due to Rask that the Bruins were only down a single goal.

And like most of the games this post season, the Bruins who returned for the third period seemed almost like an entirely different team than the one that was on the ice in the middle frame. Jordan Stall took a boarding penalty 49 seconds into the final twenty, and though the Bruins had been unable to score on their previous two opportunities on the man advantage, Marcus Johansson, by going to the dirty areas and being patient, was able to lift a rebounding puck over Petr Mrazek to knot things up with 23 seconds left on Stall’s penalty.

Fifteen seconds after everything was tied up, Dougie Hamilton found himself in the box for Carolina, for a somewhat questionable roughing penalty on Joakim Nordstrom. Thirteen seconds into the power play—and 28 seconds after tying the game—the Bruins were leading for the first time since the 2:55 mark of the first period. This time it was Jake DeBrusk to Brad Marchand to Patrice Bergeron for giving them the go-ahead goal.

“I thought the third was the way we want to play and not going to lie, the second goal got us going and got the momentum on our side, and then we got rolling. But yeah, the third period is a little more of what the type of game that we want to bring, but again, we’ve got to be better. They’re a good team and it was a tough game tonight,” shared Bergeron.

There is still a lot of hockey expected in this series to see who moves on to the Stanley Cup Final, but for the Bruins, getting a 5-2 win speaks to their dogged perseverance. After all, the Carolina Hurricanes allowed just five goals total in their four games against the New York Islanders during the second round. So for them to allow five goals in just a single game—a game that ended their six-game winning streak, speaks not only to the skill and steadfastness of the Bruins, but also to their impressive belief in each other on the ice and what, as a team, they can do and are expected to do.

For both teams they now have a little bit of rest, as they don’t play again until Sunday afternoon at 3:00 pm eastern time. Undoubtedly the physicality of the series is liable to increase some as both teams continue to prove who has the will, skill, and desire to take on whomever wins in the West Coast Final, which begins Saturday night on NBC pitting the St. Louis Blues and the San Jose Sharks against each other at 8:00pm eastern time.