Bruins grind down Senators, 3-1
David Pastrnak scores twice in win
The Ottawa Senators have given the Bruins fits this season and, in Monday’s matinee, they proved again to be no pushover.
But the B’s did what they could to make sure they won’t be seeing the Sens in the first round of the playoffs.
The Sens came into the Garden with two wins over the B’s to their credit this season, as well as a 7-2-1 record in their previous 10 to pull the edge of the playoff bubble into view. But David Pastrnak scored a pair of goals and Linus Ullmark made 30 saves to send the B’s out on a four-game Western trip with a 3-1 victory, their fourth straight win.
“I give them credit,” said B’s coach Jim Montgomery. “They’re playing 2- in-2, back- to- back games and they play the right way. They’re above you all the time. They’re hard, they’re physical, they go to hard areas, they play playoff-type hockey. That’s a team that, if they keep pushing, they’re going to be right on the doorstep.”
But the B’s may have pushed them off that doorstep. After Monday’s loss, the Sens were five points behind eighth-place Pittsburgh, which was playing on Monday night, and they had four teams in between themselves and the Penguins.
The Sens played the appropriately desperate brand of hockey for their current lot in life, but the B’s matched them in that department, and then the league leaders’ world- class talent won out in the end.
The first period had some good energy — and lot of penalties. The B’s had two power-play chances that went for naught while the Sens had a 5-on-3 for 1:50 that the
B’s expunged, as they did another conventional Ottawa PP. While the B’s went 0-for- 4 on the power-play, their league-leading penalty kill stepped up again, going 3-for- 3 against the NHL’S third-ranked power play.
“Real ly impor tant . They’re one of the best power plays in the league and we had to go 5-on-3 for a long time,” said Montgomery. “Again, the penalty-killers, plus Linus. He was excellent tonight.”
But there were also a couple of goals scored in the opening period. First, Jake Debrusk scored his second goal in as many games and seventh in his last eight games dating back to before his 17-game absence. He put the B’s up 1- 0 at 15:09 with his 18th of the season. Brad Marchand beat Nikita Zaitsev in a puck battle in the right corner and got it to Debrusk in the circle. With Patrice Bergeron an option for a possible backdoor pass, Debrusk took it to the net himself. Goalie Kevin Mandolese made the first stop, but Debrusk scored off his own rebound for the 1- 0 lead.
The B’s couldn’t get out of the first with it, however.
In the final minute, Matt Grzelcyk tried to drop the puck back to Charlie MCAvoy but a trailing Dylan Gambrell picked it off and fed Claude Giroux, who tucked it between Ullmark’s pads with 30 seconds left in the period. That would be the last puck to get by the Bruin goalie.
Much of the second period belonged to the goalies. Mandolese made a good stop on David Krejci on a backdoor play, but the save of the game came from Ullmark. Brady Tkachuk blew up Hampus Lindholm behind the B’s net and fed Gambrell in the slot, but Ullmark made a brilliant glove snare to keep the game even.
The B’s forged ahead with 2:54 left in the period.
Pastrnak had scored just one goal in his previous six games and had not scored a 5- on-5 goal since the lastminute tally he notched in Florida on Jan. 28. But he picked up No. 40 off a nice play by Mcavoy. The defenseman made a pretty spino-rama move at the right point to lose his man and feed Pastrnak on the left dot. The sniper took a couple of steps to the bottom of the circle and snapped it over Mandolese’s glove shoulder for the 2-1 lead heading into the third. It was a goalscorer’s goal.
And it was Pastrnak who finally gave the B’s a little breathing room with 7:50 left in the third period. As the B’s battled to get the puck out of their zone near the right point, MCAvoy eventually flipped it out from his knees, giving Pastrnak a clean breakaway. He threw a fake at Mandolese and calmly slid a backhander through the goalie’s pads to make it 3-1.
“Unbelievable plays on both goals of mine (from Mcavoy). Great job by Charlie,” said Pastrnak.
The win improved the B’s record to 43-8-5 as they head out on a trip that will take them to Seattle, Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary. They’ve now got a whopping 15-point lead over the second-place Maple Leafs for the Atlantic Division and a nine-point bulge over the Hurricanes for the Presidents’ Trophy.
But the dash to the regular season finish line promises to be a challenge. They’ve got 15 games in March and a half dozen back-to-backs the rest of the way.
“We’re battling. It’s not going to be easy down the stretch,” said Krejci. “Everybody knows we’re on top of the league and everybody’s coming here and bringing their best, working their hardest. We have to be mentally ready because we know physically we can do it. But this time of year, it’s a mental battle.”
But there haven’t been many battles this year for which the B’s have not been ready.