The Boston Bruins played the New Jersey Devils in Jersey.
The B’s started strong against the Devils when only a few minutes into the first, Pavel Zacha picked off the pass from Jesper Bratt, Zacha fed David Pastrňák, and Pastrňák found Morgan Geekie back-door for an easy one-t into the back of the net.
Bruins goal-tender Jeremy Swayman played fantastic in the first period stopping all of the Devil’s scoring attempts. The Bruins held the 1-goal lead through the entire first period,
But it all started to fall apart in the second when number 91 Dawson Mercer shot the puck top right on Swayman
The Bruins still had many scoring chances, but couldn’t capitalize, a profound highlight is when center number 19 John Beecher fed Justin Brazeau back-door but just couldn’t bury. But after Brazeau missed, he fell into Devils goalie Jacob Markstrom which led Markstrom to leave the ice for the rest of the night.
Devils back-up goalie Jake Allen subbed in for the night and played lights-out stopping all of the Bruins advances making big saves left and right.
The Devils then went back on the attack, and on the power play a shot by Dougie Hamilton just barely beat Swayman down low.
The Bruins couldn’t handle the Devils heat, the Devil’s scored 3 more unanswered goals all on the power play. The Devils spent most of the game playing around with the puck in the Bruins D-zone.
Part of the problem was the Bruins kept getting penalties and couldn’t clear the puck on the penalty kill.
At the end of the second, Allen made an amazing back-door save keeping the Devils lead to 4-1.
In the 3rd period, with 6 minutes to go, the Devil’s scored their fifth goal to end a stellar 5-1 night.
Highlights here.10:15
Could this start a curse? Probably not, in the past the Bruins have had their ups and downs throughout countless seasons. Such as last season when they beat the Florida Panthers in the regular season countless times, but when it came down to when it truly mattered in the playoffs, they ended up losing to the Panthers.
The Bruins aren’t the team they used to be, especially after losing former captains Zdeno Chara and Patrice Bergeron who retired 2 seasons ago. but they have pulled through worse. They probably won’t go any farther than the second round playoffs this season only because there are just better teams out there this season.
Also, Marchand and Pastarnak can’t do it all this season. Even though they are both one of the best NHL players this season doesn’t mean they can carry the rest of the team for the cup. The other players on the Bruins aren’t bad, it’s just that they aren’t the same team.
Furthermore, the Bruins have also been known for beating teams that outrank them and losing to teams they outrank, so there isn’t much of a problem with one game. For example, Bruins were the number one team in the NHL last season, and in the finals against the Florida Panthers, they lost because the Panthers outworked them.
If it’s multiple games where the bruins go on a losing streak, then it could be a problem, but this loss was probably just a bump in the road heading toward a great season.
