The Blackhawks got the first chance in the first period as Lukas Reichel skated right past Pavel Zacha and Jordan Oesterle, but Bruins goalie Jeremy Swayman blocked the shot. The Hawks struck first when Connor Murphy passed to old buddy Nick Foligno. Foligno skated around the net and passed to Alex Vlasic in the slot. Vlasic scored and the Hawks were up 1-0 just 1:23 into the game. The Bruins first shot didn't come until 2:40 into the game when Cole Koepke passed back to Oesterle for a one timer, stopped by Hawks goalie Peter Mrazek. The Bruins got the first power play when Murphy flipped the puck out of the arena for a delay of game penalty 4:50 into the period. Elias Lindholm jammed it on net but Marchand and Zacha couldn't get it in. Charlie McAvoy's slapshot was also stopped by Mrazek. With 7:43 left in the period, Oesterle passed down low to Justin Brazeau. He passed back to Geekie who fired it off Mrazek. Mrazek never saw the puck squirt behind him and Geekie jammed it in to tie the game. Just over a minute later, John Beecher was sent to the box for tripping. On the power play, Vlasic passed down low to Teuvo Teravainen but Swayman stopped the shot attempt. Old friend Ryan Donato was also denied by Swayman to end the power play threat. With 4:18 left in the first, Charlie Coyle walked in alone but was stopped by Mrazek. The Bruins missed a goal by inches with 14 seconds left when Lindholm passed it to Marchand who fired it past Mrazek....off the post. The puck squirted under Mrazek but bounced an inch too far to the right. The Bruins did get a power play out of it because Wyatt Kaiser swept the puck out of the way and crashed into the net for a delay of game penalty. The Bruins went into the break tied at 1-1.
The Bruins started the second period on the power play and Mrazek came up big for Chicago. Pastrnak fired it on net and Lindholm had a shot at the rebound but Peter stopped him cold. Pastrnak had another shot at it but Mrazek made the save to kill off the penalty. Another old friend Tyler Bertuzzi fired a slapshot but Swayman saved it using his head. With just under three minutes gone in the second period, Mason Lohrei passed low to Pastrnak. Pastrnak saw Marchand open in his usual slot and Brad scored his ninth goal of the season to put the Bruins ahead. Just three minutes later, Oesterle passed the puck to Pastrnak shot the puck off Mrazek and Marchand backhanded the rebound in for his second goal of the game. With 8:37 left in the period, Geekie fired on net and Zacha just missed putting the rebound in. With 4:52 left, Nikita Zadorov was called for holding and the Blackhawks went on the power play. The Bruins killed it off but disaster struck with 1:37 left in the period. Murphy passed it to Ilya Mikheyev who then passed to Jason Dickinson. Dickinson fired on net....goal! The Bruins had to settle for going into the third period up 3-2.
The game essentially was on five minutes into the third period. Lohrei blocked a shot by Reichel and Brazeau corralled the puck. He fired it up the ice to Geekie on a breakaway. Geekie moved in, shot and scored to put the Bruins up by two with just under 15 minutes to go. Ninety seconds later Swayman made a huge stop on a Bedard partial breakaway that had Connor so mad that he broke his own stick on the bench. With 11 minutes left in the game, Mikheyev was called for tripping to put the Bruins on the power play. McAvoy's slapshot beat Mrazek clean but it hit off the crossbar. Other than that, the Bruins failed to score. Coyle and Brazeau both were robbed by Mrazek as well. With 5:44 left it looked like Bedard high sticked Marchand and the slow motion replay showed that Brad might have embellished a little but the stick still made contact. The Bruins basically kept the puck away for two minutes to fail on the power play but maintain the two goal lead. The Blackhawks circled the net but made a fatal mistake when they had too many men on the ice with 1:45 left. They couldn't use the man advantage for the rest of the period and the Bruins had won the game 4-2.
Bruins win
Reaction:
The Blackhawks are a bad team and the Bruins have definitely taken advantage of their currently soft schedule, but these are the teams you need to beat. The Joe Sacco Bruins have won 5 of their last 7 games since Jim Montgomery shuffled off to St. Louis and 10 points is 10 points no matter who its against. The Bruins are still behind the Florida Panthers but the gap is closing as they're suffering from a small Stanley Cup hangover. Once the Bruins get Hampus Lindholm back, their defense should be bolstered without having to rely on the Jordan Oesterle's of the world, although he did get a big assist tonight. The Bruins are still a couple of forwards away from competing for the Stanley Cup but isn't that always the case? The win improved the Bruins to 14-11-3, good for 31 points and just 3 points behind the Toronto Maple Leafs for first place in the Atlantic Division. The Bruins return to action this Saturday afternoon for a matinee tilt against the Philadelphia Flyers. The game begins at 1:00 PM at TD Garden.
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