BOSTON – Exactly one week after falling 3-2 in overtime to the Montreal Canadiens at the Bell Centre, the Boston Bruins welcomed their rivals to TD Garden for the first time this season. After last Saturday’s performance, which contributed to Bruins coach Jim Montgomery making the team skate sprints at the end of practice throughout the week, all eyes were on how Boston would respond in the rematch.
This time, the Bruins left no doubts, winning 5-2 in what Montgomery agreed was their “most complete” 60-minute effort so far this season.
“Rush defense was good, it was really good,” Montgomery said. “We saw what we wanted offensively too as far as– we hadn’t played in awhile, and sometimes when you hadn’t played in awhile, you’re not back in the rhythm of playing fast and moving pucks quickly north, and I thought we did a really good job of that in the first period, and I thought it really carried over.”
Trent Frederic scored twice, and David Pastrnak added three assists for Boston in the win. The Bruins doubled Montreal’s shot total (44-22), and stormed to a 3-0 lead by the 5:18 mark of the second period.
Each side scored twice more before settling on the 5-2 final, but as opposed to early this season when the Bruins had a brief run of giving up multi-goal leads, this time they held on tight and never let go of the lead.
“What I really liked about tonight was the things that we worked on in practice, we went out and executed,” said Brad Marchand, who tallied his 500th and 501st career assist on Saturday. “Some of the things that we let slip last time that we played Montreal, we were better at. So just shows that we’re growing as a group.”
It was a night where everything clicked. Aside from the offensive zone production and rush defense, Boston scored two crucial power-play goals out of five opportunities. The same team that’s allowed an average of 3.8 power play opportunities per game held Montreal to just two chances on the man-advantage, and shut down both.
Additionally, it was a relatively quiet night for Swayman, facing just 22 shots, but he made big stops when necessary to keep the Habs out of reach. After relying heavily on the stellar play of Swayman and Linus Ullmark to earn the team wins, Swayman was happy to see the team in front of him take a step forward.
“We just kept a full 60 [minutes], and that’s something that we’ve been working on as a team, and to see it tonight was really important for us going forward,” Swayman said.
With members of the 1970 and 1972 Stanley Cup-winning Bruins teams in the building, raising their championship banners to the rafters before the game, the current Bruins cited the ceremony as extra motivation to earn the result.
Boston faces three more Atlantic Division matchups coming in the next week, and the question is now whether or not Saturday’s performance has the momentum to carry them through.