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Bruins ride into holiday break with win over Caps |
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Ty Anderson
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Powered by two goals in a 2:18 stretch late in the third period, the Bruins will truly enjoy their holiday break after defeating the East-best Capitals by a 4-1 final at TD Garden.
All three of Boston’s goals in the third period came courtesy of their new-look top line, with Elias Lindholm on the board with the game-winning marker with 6:19 left in the third period, Charlie Coyle there for the insurance marker to make it a two-goal lead, and Brad Marchand providing the empty-net dagger with a gliding puck dumped into the Washington net with 1:22 left in the game.
“Three good players, they can all defend, they all have offensive capabilities, they’re veterans and experienced players, so it’s a line we can use against other teams’ top lines,” Bruins interim head coach Joe Sacco said of the Marchand-Lindholm-Coyle line. “There’s a lot of balance there.
“They just seem to be playing well together right now.”
But while the B’s best played a major part in the victory, it was a strong start from the Bruins’ second power-play unit that got the holiday festivities underway in Boston’s barn.
Granted a late-period power-play opportunity in the opening frame following a Martin Fehervary board on the Bruins’ Johnny Beecher, the Bruins struck first behind a Justin Brazeau putaway.
The goal, which was good for Brazeau’s first since Dec. 3, came with helpers to Morgan Geekie and Mason Lohrei, was the Black and Gold’s sixth power-play tally in their last 10 games.
That recent success over that span is certainly noteworthy, too, as it’s propelled the Bruins into the top half of the league in terms of power-play percentage over that span (13th-best in the league at the time of the Brazeau goal), and with the B’s second unit doing some notable damage over that span.
But given a power-play opportunity of their own in the second period, the Capitals responded, and off an absolute bomb from winger Jakub Vrana, scored at the 4:50 mark of the period. The goal, which caught a piece of Jeremy Swayman’s shoulder before rocketing into the back of the Boston net, was all the Caps had to show for a period that featured just four shots from Washington and seven from Boston.
The real story of the second period came in the neutral zone, however, as Bruins winger David Pastrnak appeared to tweak something avoiding a collision with Washington’s Tom Wilson.
Pastrnak would return for a few more shifts, but did not appear to be at full strength, and sat out the final eight minutes and change of the second period. Pastrnak did not return for the third period, and was ruled out for the remainder of the game shortly into the final frame.
With Pastrnak unavailable for the remainder of the second period and all of the third period, the Bruins initially promoted Oliver Wahlstrom up to the top line. But a boarding major called on Wahlstrom just 10 seconds into the third period ended that experiment (and Wahlstrom’s night by way of a game misconduct), and threw the B’s already-shorthanded forward group into even more of a blender.
Speaking after the victory, Sacco did not have an update on Pastrnak’s status.
Riding their top dogs with the break on the horizon, the Bruins truly won this game during the five-minute kill, where they generated consistent pressure and held the Capitals without a single shot on goal for the full five minutes of a five-on-four advantage for Washington.
By the night’s end, the Bruins held the Capitals to just 11 shots on goal.
It’s the lowest shot total by a Bruins opponent since the Bruins held the Lightning to just 11 shots in a head-to-head back on Dec. 18, 1993. Overall, it’s just the seventh time in the century-long history of the Bruins that their opponent had no more than 11 shots in a game.
The Bruins will now have three full days off before returning to action Friday night in Columbus. It will mark the start of a home-and-home, back-to-back between the B’s and Blue Jackets.
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