Due to contractual obligations for recording Goalie Hugs during the last game on Thursday, I wasn’t able to jot down some quick thoughts on the action in Pittsburgh.
So today, you’re getting a two-fer.
Pittsburgh takeaways
The Boston Bruins scored three unanswered goals in the first period after giving up the game’s first goal and ended up beating the Pittsburgh Penguins, 6-2, at PPG Paints Arena Thursday night.
Five different Bruins each had a goal in the effort.
One of the signs that a team is improving in the “potentially scary good now and/or relatively soon if not this season, but next” department is when that team starts beating up on teams they’re supposed to beat.
In other words, take Boston, for example.
The B’s entered Thursday first in the Atlantic Division, while the Pens were seventh in the Metropolitan Division. That has the potential for being a trap game, but no Boston won convincingly by a four-goal deficit.
Better yet, they had scoring from a range of players too.
Not every night is going to be as great as Thursday night, but it’s good to see Pavel Zacha net a pair of goals, Morgan Geekie extend his goal-scoring streak to three games and Fraser Minten score a goal after failing to record a point in the last four games.
Oh, and Mark Kastelic had a great redirection on a shot by Frédéric Brunet in Brunet’s return to the lineup from being a healthy scratch and Elias Lindholm continues to have a rejuvenating effort in his quest for whatever the equivalent for a third line center’s Hart Memorial Trophy might be.
Is Elias Lindholm an early front runner for this year’s Seventh Player Award? My column:
And now, the Florida matinée
The Boston Bruins and Florida Panthers reminded everyone that they don’t like each other very much Sunday afternoon at TD Garden as the Bruins defeated Florida, 4-1, with 126 penalty minutes combined.
The whole Tkachuk family can’t help but make it about themselves, can they? Brian Burke’s comment at the Hockey Hall of Fame was funny, especially when you remember who drafted Matthew Tkachuk in Calgary (it was Burke).
Anyway, to outdo his father, Keith, Brady Tkachuk decided fighting Nikita Zadorov two seconds after the opening faceoff was a good idea.
Unfortunately for Brady, it wasn’t.
Then Elias Lindholm stayed hot and scored a goal that may or may not have actually crossed the goal line, but I guess the interpretation of “definitive” is more “if it probably went in, it went in” nowadays.
As a fan, I’m not complaining when it happens for my team. Only against. But then again, it would be nice to see consistency across the board.
Michael Eyssimont followed Lindholm’s goal with a quick goal of his own to give Boston a, 2-0, lead in the opening frame.
Sunday was Eyssimont’s season debut after being recalled from the Providence Bruins after James Hagens was placed on injured reserve (IR) on Saturday.
Eyssimont has been off to a hot start in Providence with multiple hat tricks and 13-3–16 totals in eight games in the American Hockey League (AHL) so far this season.
Yes, you read that right. 13 goals in eight games.
Hagens, meanwhile, is out for “weeks” per Boston’s head coach, Marco Sturm.
Anytime a player is placed on injured reserve there’s a minimum of seven days from the date of the injury before they can return. In actuality, players that go on the IR are usually out at least two weeks or more.
Mark Kastelic and former Bruin, Garnet Hathaway, exchanged pleasantries shortly after Eyssimont’s goal. Despite chippy play the rest of the day, the gloves remained on.
Boston scored their third-unanswered goal of the first period courtesy of a Morgan Geekie power-play goal– marking the fourth goal in four games for Geekie in the process.
Sure, Carter Verhaeghe scored late in the opening frame to make it a two-goal game once more, but the Bruins held their own– backed by a 40-save effort by Jeremy Swayman in the afternoon’s victory.
58 seconds into the third period, JJ Peterka notched his fifth goal of the season to give Boston another three-goal lead.
Not to be outdone by his brother, Brady, Matthew Tkachuk was ejected from the game midway through the third period.
The official charges were reported as two minutes for roughing and a ten-minute misconduct at 11:52 of the final frame after the elder brother Tkachuk tried to engage Fraser Minten in some shenanigans.
The B’s extended their home winning streak to seven games while Swayman turned aside the most shots faced by a Bruins goaltender so far this season (40 saves on 41 shots against).
Boston allowed their most shots against in any first period and any third period this season (18 and 14, respectively), but managed to record a season-high 17 shots on goal in the second period against Florida.
Despite that, the Panthers outshot the Bruins, 41-36, Sunday afternoon.
One more injury note from Sunday, Matthew Poitras returned to the lineup in place of Sean Kuraly who stood in for Poitras in Pittsburgh.
Boston is now 13-4-1 on the season and remains on top of the Atlantic Division standings with 27 points.
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