Opportunity ahead for Bruins

Boston highest seed left in East in NHL playoffs

The 128-point Lightning are eliminated. The Flames are also gone, along with the Predators, Penguins and Maple Leafs.

Five teams with 100 or more regularseason points are gone, and the Sharks needed a major rally to stay alive Tuesday. The defending champion Capitals, another 100-point team, faced a Game 7 Wednesday against the Hurricanes.

But the Bruins will be in the second round due to a 5-1 Game 7 triumph against the Maple Leafs on Tuesday at TD Garden in Boston. The 107-point Bruins stand as the most accomplished regular-season team still alive in the playoffs.

The playoff bracket is set up to give the Bruins the same kind of opportunity for a Stanley Cup championship that they had when they last won in 2010-11.

While the spotlight was rightfully on the Lightning for their NHL-record-tying 62-win season, the Bruins put together their own impressive season, marked by consistency and finding different ways to win.

The most interesting aspect of the Bruins is that they boast stars, but they don’t always need their stars to dominate to win.

That was true against the Maple Leafs. It wasn’t David Pastrnak, Patrice Bergeron or Brad Marchand delivering key goals. Joakim Nordstrom, Marcus Johansson, Sean Kuraly and Charlie Coyle, all considered bottom six forwards, scored the first four Bruins’ goals.

When it was a 2-1 game in the second period, the Maple Leafs mounted an impressive charge. Plenty of pressure in the Bruins’ defensive zone. Decent scoring chances. In a postgame interview with NBC, Boston goalie Tuukka Rask said he didn’t think his team played particularly well in the first two periods.

But the Bruins found a way to prevent the speedy, high-powered Toronto offense from finding the net for the tying goal. That’s why the Bruins were among the NHL’s most consistent teams. They don’t have to play a perfect game to win.

The Maple Leafs believed they played well for the first two periods, but they couldn’t find a way to win against a hardworking Bruins team.

The Bruins cashed in on two Toronto defensive lapses to grab a 2-0 lead and that’s all they needed to beat the Maple Leafs for the second consecutive year in a Game 7 and the third time in the last three meetings.

These Bruins know how to hold a lead. Rask made important saves and Boston’s defense did the rest. The Bruins’ poise and grit are perfect for Game 7 success. They are a resilient group, proved by the fact that they trailed 3-2 in their series.

Boston now readies for a secondround series starting Thursday against the Blue Jackets, the giant slayer who swept the highly favored Lightning. The Blue Jackets are technically the lowest seed in the Eastern Conference, but they are playing like a 100-point team.

They shocked a Lightning team that faced no adversity during the regular season. They won’t shock the Bruins, and the Bruins aren’t likely to rattle like the Lightning did.

The Bruins faced plenty of adversity this season. They seem to thrive on it. They might even play their best hockey when adversity shows up.