Officially Brad Marchand was listed today as a game-time decision, but the captain took the warmup for Game 6 against the Florida Panthers, and he didn’t hang around to play games with the four Panthers tooling around after time ran out on the warmup. Brandon Montour was last off the ice, and Marchand obviously had better things to do, so the expectation here is Marchand returns tonight.
A-I image by Daryl Vautour
The winner of the series gets the New York Rangers in the Eastern Conference Final, beginning at MSG sometime next week. If the Bruins force a Game 7 of the current second-round series, it will be played Sunday in Sunrise, Fla. (time TBA).
FIRST PERIOD
Marchand starts the game with Pavel Zacha and Justin Brazeau. Paul Maurice, who has brought in pests Nick Cousins and Ryan Lomberg to skate fourth line with Kevin Stenlund, had Sasha Barkov line to start.
Bruins gets chances with David Pastrnak, Trent Frederic and Morgan Geekie causing havoc and landing the first two shots of the game.
Bruins get more pressure, and Aaron Ekblad takes the first penalty at 3:38 for hooking. Boston to the powerplay. Pat Maroon skates into Ekblad’s path.
Reinhart got a 2-on-1 and a pass across to Stenlund, but Jeremy Swayman sealed off the angle.
Vladimir Tarasenko in front, save Swayman. The Panthers are starting to level this off. The question is whether the Bruins’ frentic start is only that or if they’ve got the game tonight to match Florida’s heretofore superior 5-on-5 game.
The Bruins landed the first four shots of the game, probably within the game’s first four shifts. It’s been all Florida since then, and the Panthers now have a 6-4 shots advantage.
Last breakout Charlie McAvoy got hacked in the skate, went down, no call, but the Panthers took the puck, quickly regrouped and sent it back in hard to the RW corner – like we talked about in this space prior to the series – but Parker Wotherspoon executed a hard switch of the puck to the weak side, where it was stopped by Zacha, who would receive a pass and miss the Florida net with a hard shot.
(The Bruins aren’t getting as many chances, and when they do they miss their opportunities to make Sergei Bobrovsky work.)
Bruins had an odd man, but Hampus Lindholm passed to Trent Frederic and it skipped under his stick. The fans gave it to Lindholm for not shooting from the more-direct angle.
The Panthers get more chances, as Oliver Ekman-Larsson’s shot scraped the crossbar.
Pastrnak fights through Montour to swat a pass onto Bobrovsky and looks to the stripes – nothing doing.
Zacha scores with 52.8 left on a breakaway. 1-0 Bruins. Go figure.
A double roar pounded the walls of TD Garden, as Brandon Carlo had just finished jousting Carter Verhaeghe to the ice when Zacha was sprung by DeBrusk. Wotherspoon also assisted. It was Zacha’s first goal of the playoffs.
First-period shots: 8-7 Florida
SECOND PERIOD
Pastrnak gets a breakaway, save Bobrovsky.
Bruins turn it over on a breakout Peeke to Coyle, shot through a screen off the post.
McAvoy hobbled but returns.
The Bruins get … wait for it … a penalty for too many men on the ice. Florida to the powerplay. Geekie serves. Bruins get the kill.
Swayman gloves Tkachuk’s shot from the right circle, drawing chants from the home crowd.
Lomberg, trying to find relevance, tries to snow Swayman and is run over by Peeke to the approval of the home crowd.
The Bruins are more disruptive this period with their forecheck, but any offense is coming on counterattacking plays, while the Panthers are sticking to the heavy game, switching the puck on hard-arounds whenever they get it in Boston’s zone, hoping to tire out the Bruins and turn 5-on-5 shifts into quasi-powerplays.
It’s a good game, as we approach the midway point with the Bruins leading 1-0.
Bruins get a congested zone entry that yields a Frederic shot blocked and sealed by Bobrovsky.
Bruins get a close call, as Pastrnak received a cross-ice feed from Geekie too wide so he spun it back around and McAvoy reached for it, tipping it wide of the left post.
The Bruins survive an extended shift with Tkachuk and Bennett working the puck low, but a quick re-entry got Barkov a look that he caught the outside of the right post with from a bad angle. Swayman seemed to have it covered, but you never know on those, especially in the era of the “reverse V” technique that does not completely seal off the post the way stand-up goalie used to hug the post in bygone eras of the game.
In the now, Florida is pushing and just had it best shift of the game. Can it carry on with other lines following a network-TV-long timeout?
Anton Lundell inevitably ties the game for Florida at 12:44 of the second period, the product of the Panthers’ heavy forecheck and in-zone puck-possession pressure.
Pastrnak scoffs a glittering opportunity, faking shot and passing to Marchand only to hit traffic and lose the chance. The Bruins have left a few opportunities like this on the table, something they can ill afford to do when clean looks at Bobrovsky are just not growing on trees.
It would have been a storybook goal, and Pastrnak very well could have been thinking only in best-play mode, but it didn’t go, and now Coyle is in the penalty box for interference with 5:38 remaining in the period.
Marchand just carried a bouncing puck over his own blue line, and three Panthers in great position decline to run at him. It’s quite obvious that Maurice has instructed his team to lay off Marchand except in a pure hockey-play situation where a hit would be 100% the byproduct thereof. He wants Marchand to be a non-story. Masterful.
The period ends 1-1.
The Panthers extended their shots-on-goal lead to 21-14.
THIRD PERIOD
Panthers with pressure, Swayman with more season-saving stops.
Brazeau felled in a subtle collision with Verhaeghe that stops the game for review and a referees’ huddle, but no call. Looked like Verhaeghe meant to blindside Brazeau with subtle contact to disrupt the Bruins’ transition game and caught him in the face.
Bruins ice the puck, Florida wins the draw, Swayman blocks Sam Reinhart’s shot from the shot, and Brandon Carlo swats the puck out of the air with his open hand and Swayman has to catch it.
The Bruins went into the third period with a 2-1 edge in faceoff percentage, but the Panthers are winning some O-zone draws and continuing to turn them into shots and more O-zone draws.
Marchand pulls up left halfwall and goes back to Wotherspoon, who dodges the block and fires low glove side. Bobrovsky snares it.
The Bruins get another shot and another O-zone faceoff. They win it, and this time Bobrovsky catches McAvoy’s shot from the point. Three straight O-zone draws. The Bruins need this right now. Badly.
They win another, and Lohrei passes to McAvoy, who takes it to the net. Scrum ensues and Bennett and Frederic clinch.4
Bruins win another, save Bobrovsky, Pastrnak tries to wrap it, no go, puck down Boston’s end.
Bruins’ best 5-on-5 stretch of the game. Their .633 faceoff percentage has factored big time.
The Bruins ice the puck multiple times, but Geekie wins the draw against Lundell that gets the puck out of harm’s way, and now the Bruins get a draw in the Florida zone. Save Bobrovsky, and the tables have momentarily turned.
The Bruins are looking to strike on one of these, and a Florida icing gives them another chance with the score tied 1-1 and 7:02 remaining on the third-period clock.
McAvoy hits Bennett, Panthers ice the puck, Bennett skates up to McAvoy, who greets Bennett with a straight arm to the face, McAvoy goes to the penalty box.
Right according to the script.
Evan Rodrigues trips Johnny Beecher during a puck battle after a big chance for Florida, and it’s 4v4 for the final 23 seconds of McAvoy’s PIM with 4:26 on the game clock.
McAvoy bears down the slot on the powerplay and passes to Pastrnak in the left circle. Panthers read it, and the puck never reaches Bobrovsky. Hundreds of heads in the balcony nearly explode.
Bruins get another possession, James van Riemsdyk makes a very smart play by taking the puck to Bobrovsky. Bruins get a chance at fresh legs for the next O-zone faceoff. The penalty is over, and there is 2:19 left in regulation.
Barkov to Tkachuk, save Swayman, but Gustav Forsling, perhaps the most understated player in the series, fires the rebound short-side to give the Panthers the lead with 1:33 remaining in regulation.
Until now, Forsling’s best play was his 1-on-1 shutdown of Pastrnak in this period and maneuver of the puck forward in transition. Just an outstanding hockey player, similar to what the Chicago Blackhawks had in Niklas Hjarlmarsson at the height of their powers.
Faceoff in Florida’s end, Swayman to the bench. 1:26 left.
Bruins get a huge icing call. The puck goes off Forsling’s skate and just misses the post. The hero was almost the goat.
Florida wins, 2-1.
Idiots in the balcony throw cans.
Class only matters when you lose. Many applaud the Bruins for an excellent season.
The Bruins salute the crowd, lotta stick taps and hugs for Swayman. A goalie hug in defeat, just no V for victory this time. Most likely their last.
Rink Rap with Mick Colageo 