Three Takeaways from Bruins' Opening Night Win Over Blackhawks

The Boston Bruins opened their Centennial season on a winning note, topping the Chicago Blackhawks 3-1 at TD Garden on Wednesday night – it wasn’t a perfect 60 minutes of hockey, but the B’s got the job done.

Three takeaways on the opening night victory, below:

Poitras and Beecher, training camp’s pleasant surprises, both made their NHL debut on Wednesday, but did not let the bright lights hinder their production.

The 19-year-old Poitras centered a line with Trent Frederic and Morgan Geekie, and collected his first pro point on the Bruins’ first tally of the game. Poitras threaded the puck to Brandon Carlo, who released a shot from the point that was tipped in by a net-front Frederic to tie it up 1-1 at 11:22 in the opening frame.

“Incredible, I think you saw it through the entire game. Being 19 years old, or 18 years old, and having poise like that with the puck isn’t easy. It’s pretty impressive what he’s able to do,” Carlo said of Poitras.

Beecher played his fourth line center role to a T, forcing sustained O-zone time and leaning into his physical game. The University of Michigan product dropped the gloves with Chicago’s Jason Dickinson early in the third period, shifting the momentum for the Bruins in a game where they let the Blackhawks hang around.

“Had to kind of turn around and face what I had to come, but no problem with doing it. I was actually able to kind of offset the penalty so it worked out,” Beecher said. “Obviously at that point of the game too you want the crowd to be in it.”

Bruins coach Jim Montgomery called his squad’s overall performance “very average,” and he was right. Credit to the Blackhawks, they kept the game competitive and tight until things opened up in the third, but there were clear areas where the B’s will look to improve – namely, special teams, speed and playing as more of a unit.

As the coach acknowledged, it’s the first game of the season with a new lineup and the kinks will eventually work themselves out, but this group has a lot more to give.

“I didn’t think we grew our game, but it’s the first game of the year,” Montgomery said. “I didn’t think we played fast enough, consistently enough. … There’s a lot of things to work on, you expect that in game one. We got the result, we did a lot of good things.”

Montgomery toyed with his lines, like he did more a majority of last season, but he’s now looking for players to click and aiming for less in-game adjustments in the future. Montgomery gave Poitras some time with Brad Marchand tonight to experiment with their connection.

“I did it more last year I thought in the third period only, but it was because guys were so used to playing with each other. I wanted to change things up when things were stale,” Montgomery said. “This year, I’d kind of like to let them play together a little longer to build a chemistry that they have.”

Lucic did not disappoint in his long-awaited homecoming, and the TD Garden faithful were happy to have him back. The “Looooch” cheers were well-deserved as the veteran played with real purpose and consistently inserted himself into the rush through 13:39 of ice time.

David Pastrnak’s first goal of the night, which put the Bruins up 2-1 at 13:09 of the second period, was set up by Lucic, who entered the zone through middle ice and dished it to Pastrnak from the right side for the sharpshooter to snap it past Blackhawks goalie Arvid Soderblom.

“I thought Milan, he’s had a really good camp and he’s carried it over. He came here in tremendous shape,” Montgomery said. “Not only what you guys see on the ice, but the way he’s talking on the bench, he’s taking over a real important leadership role of talking about how to build our team game, about the important details.”

Montgomery mixed the lines a bit in the latter half of the game, promoting Lucic to the line alongside Pavel Zacha and Pastrnak. As he did in preseason, Lucic proved he’s not only in Boston to make big hits and chip in an assist here and there; he can be a true difference maker. The second-time Bruin said he embraced the emotions of the night, and it evidently benefitted his play.

“Obviously it’s a special time of your life, those years that I spent here, so to be able to come back to a place that is so special to me – it’s good to have emotion and show emotion,” Lucic said.

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The Bruins will practice on Thursday and are back in action on Saturday against the Nashville Predators for a 7pm puck drop. Follow along with The Hockey News for B’s coverage all season long.