A tip of the hat, Bergy
First line propels B’s win
It appears Patrice Bergeron didn’t need a preseason game after all.
The Bruins center scored three times, and added an assist, for the fourth hat trick of his career as the B’s skated to a 6-3 homeopening win over the Ottawa Senators yesterday at TD Garden.
Bergeron didn’t see any preseason action with back and groin ailments but scored his first goal of the season last Thursday in Buffalo. Yesterday, he tripled that production.
“It’s one of those things where it’s not always a part of my game or you’re going to see often,” said Bergeron of his hat trick. “But it’s nice to have one.”
The B’s top line of Bergeron, Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak combined for five goals and six assists. With the second and third lines still not clicking in the early going, the top unit’s play brings a welcomed stability.
“I’ve been impressed with everything Bergy does,” said Bruins coach Bruce Cassidy. “We use him on both ends in every situation. Good for him tonight, we usually rely on him to get us a good start.”
Giveaways plagued the Bruins on defense, though. Matt Grzelyck had three giveaways and Brandon Carlo was exposed setting up one Ottawa chance.
A bright spot on the blue line was Charlie McAvoy with the first three-assist game of his career.
“It’s making the simple plays,” he said. “Guys making special plays. When you play with the Bergeron line, you just want to get the puck in their hands because all of them have such great hockey IQ.”
Bergeron potted the first goal 30 seconds in after Pastrnak crashed the net, and the Bruins fed off that momentum.
The power play struggled to retain the puck in its first two looks in the opening period, but in a spurt of zone time, Bergeron gave the Bruins a 2-0 advantage with 2:48 left in the first.
In the second period, the Senators netted one off the stick of Ryan Dzingel at the 17:39 mark. The B’s got it back when Sean Kuraly dished a pass to McAvoy on the blue line. Chris Wagner then tipped in McAvoy’s blast from the point for the 3-1 lead.
A wrister by Dzingel from outside the top of the right circle trickled past goaltender Tuukka Rask to cut the lead to 3-2 with 7:47 left in the period.
Bergeron gave the B’s an insurance tally with 15:22 left in the third, lifting a backhander off a defender and past Mike Condon for his third goal.
Pastrnak took a backhand pass from Bergeron to give the Bruins a 5-2 advantage with 3:29 left in the game for the latter’s fourth point of the contest. The winger scored his second goal with 1:38 left on an empty-netter from the opposing blue line.
The Senators scored nearly half a minute later with 2:57 left when Bobby Ryan found twine behind Rask, who made 28 saves.
While there’s still a lot to work on — defensive-end turnovers, power play, second- and third-line production — it was the kind of start on home ice the Bruins needed.
“It was nice to get back in the win column here in front of our fans,” said Cassidy. “Especially this year with training camp, the way it’s been. We want to play better here, we want to establish that and I think we did that today.”
The Bruins can keep that going when they return to home ice on Thursday night against the Edmonton Oilers.