Bye for now from bounce-back B’s
Among the Bruins there is understandable pride in the team’s performance and resiliency over the past three-plus months.
After Sunday’s wildly entertaining 6-5 overtime loss to the Penguins in Pittsburgh, the B’s yesterday began a four-day “bye week” break.
The Bruins looked back over the unofficial first half — they’ll actually play Game 41 in their return to action against the Canadiens in Montreal on Saturday — and spoke about the very positive trends this team has followed.
“I think we’ve done very well, with the start we had,” said coach Bruce Cassidy, recalling a team that was under .500 (6-7-4) 17 games into the campaign.
The B’s reach the midseason break with a record of 23-10-7, after going 17-3-3 in their last 23.
“(We had) a little uncertainty with our lineup,” said Cassidy of the opening month. “We were putting some youth in there (and) we had some injuries we fought through. We stayed afloat (and) battled through some adversity. We’ve gone on a good run, and (Sunday) is part of it. We got a point. It’s disappointing when you have a two-goal lead on the road and you can’t get the two. I think the first half of our year has been very good. We’ve seen good growth in a number of our players. We’ve seen our veteran guys obviously contribute, our young guys (and) the guys in between. We’ve started to see an identity for our hockey club in the past six weeks. Both our goaltenders are playing very well.
“There’s always areas where we can get better, and we will. But I like where we’re at right now. This break is coming at a good time. We could use a break. We’ve got a very heavy schedule (in the second half). I think we’re one of the teams that’s played the least amount of games (28 teams have played more) so we’re going to need our rest to keep it up.”
Winger Brad Marchand, who is following up his first NHL AllStar season with another excellent campaign (17 goals, 23 assists and plus-19 in 32 games), knew the Bruins would have growing pains early.
“We’ve been very good,” said Marchand after Sunday’s game, in which he had a goal, an assist and an unsuccessful penalty shot with 1:01 left in the third period. “We really came together the last month and a half and showed the type of team we can be. We had a lot of growing pains early on and some injuries. I think we kind of expected that to be the case — not so much the injury bug, but a lot of young guys and new guys on the team. You need time to come together. We’ve really done that.”
Goalie Tuukka Rask, who was highly self-critical after the OT loss in Pittsburgh, has generally played at a Vezina Trophy-level of late, and he loves where this team is heading.
“I think were trending up, that’s the biggest thing,” Rask said. “We obviously had a lot of injuries at the beginning; we battled through that and got bodies back and started trending up.”
Coming out of the break, the Bruins will play the rival Canadiens three times in eight days. Even clubs on rolls as impressive as the Bruins’ can see their fortunes turn 180 degrees very quickly, so their return to action will be all about consistency in effort and execution.
Bruins notes
Center Patrice Bergeron, largely on the strength of his four goals and assist in Saturday’s rout of the Carolina Hurricanes, was named the NHL’s No.1 star for the week. In three games, Bergeron totaled five goals and two assists while his team collected 5-of-6 points.
Bergeron was the second Bruin in three weeks to be honored as the league’s top player: Rask earned the accolade for Dec.17-24 on his way to being named player of the month.