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How did we get here? B's go for sweep of Rangers

May 23, 2013, 6:10 PM ET [32 Comments]
Ty Anderson
Boston Bruins Blogger •Bruins Feature Columnist • RSSArchiveCONTACT
You’d be crazy to sit there and tell anybody that the Boston Bruins would win three straight games against Henrik Lundqvist and the New York Rangers. Let alone in the playoffs. Throughout his entire career, Lundqvist has simply owned the Black-and-Gold, entering this second round series with 21 wins in 30 career games, with a .943 save-percentage and six shutouts. Crazy. But through three games of the Eastern Conference Semifinal showdown between the Rangers and Bruins, you’d be even crazier to suggest that this has been anything but a Boston decimation of the Blueshirts.

On the road, at home, it doesn’t matter: the Rangers haven’t been able to answer the challenge thrown their way from Claude Julien and the B’s.

Sure, two of the Rangers’ three losses in this series have been by just a goal, but this one really hasn’t been as close as you’d think. The Rangers, despite their talent, have been the most inconsistent playoff team I’ve ever seen in my life, and if you’re like me, you have to asking yourself just how we got to this point? And that’s where I step in to help you out.

Let’s take a look.

A line-matching neutralization

One of the biggest things you’ve seen throughout this series has been Julien’s consistent line-matching with John Tortorella and the Blueshirts.

Whenever the Derek Stepan line is out there, you’ll find the Patrice Bergeron line out there to limit their space to create offense and set things up in the neutral zone. With Bergeron holding the edge over Stepan at the dot, New York’s seldom seen their best playmaker get anything going without a shove-back from No. 37 or the Bruins’ Brad Marchand, a noted thorn in the Rangers’ side since the start of this series. This has led to what’s felt like dozens of odd-man rushes for the Black-and-Gold’s second line when the Blueshirts will get caught with too many guys down low and a pass or play picked off from one of the Bruins’ dynamic two-way forwards.

Then comes Julien’s insistence on using the heavy-skating David Krejci line with Milan Lucic and Nathan Horton on the wings as the line to shut down New York’s Mats Zuccarello-Derick Brassard-Rick Nash trio down.

While the Brassard line has been able to utilize their speed advantage over the Krejci line throughout the series, the Bruins’ captain, Zdeno Chara, has been the last line of defense and outside of a Game 2 blunder, has responded in typical ‘Z’ fashion, shutting Nash down at almost all times.

But what’s been the most important line-matching situation through three games has been Julien’s usage of the 5-foot-9 Torey Krug. By all means the fastest skater on the Boston blue-liner, the 22-year-old has gone up against the slow-as-molasses Brian Boyle line with Derek Dorsett and Taylor Pyatt on the wings. Simply leaving the New York trio in a chaotic mess with each rush up ice, the Michigan-born defensemen’s ability to find space and entry into the attacking zone has been an unbelievable asset throughout 10 periods of play, and has put the B’s in the driver’s seat. And what’s been the most shocking element of it all? The fact that the Rangers still do not have an answer towards containing the rookie’s time and space.

No-show of the New York power-play shows tuning out of coaches

In 2011, you saw the B’s somehow win a Stanley Cup despite an abysmal power-play that converted on just 10 of 88 trips to the man-advantage. It connected at an 11.4% success rate, and it was barely enough to seal the deal on the Bruins’ first Cup since 1972 as the B’s became the first team to win three Game 7s en route to a championship.

Fast forward two summers and there’s just no way in hell that the Rangers’ power-play, which has converted on just two of 38 chances this season (a 5.3 power-play percentage), can guide them out of this round, let alone a championship.

Falling in three straight games, it’s no surprise that the Rangers’ man-advantage has gone 0-for-10, and hasn’t even looked good in the process. For Tortorella, calling Carl Hagelin out for being a ‘jitterbug’ and scratching Brad Richards for tonight’s Game 4, has been a major concern, and not the fact that New York’s power-play features a clueless Brian Boyle cherry-picking back there for about a minute, completely stalling any momentum the Rangers try to generate.

From a Boston point of view, if you asked me last postseason when the B’s power-play went just 2-for-23 en route to a first round exit against the Washington Capitals, I would have suggested that the Bruins fire special teams coach Geoff Ward. It would’ve been the second year in a row that featured an anemic man-advantage. And in New York, despite personnel changes, the execution of a power-play comes back to adjustments made by the coaching staff, and the Rangers haven’t made any.

There’s been almost nothing different, and that’s something that boils back to Tortorella, and assistant coach Mike Sullivan. Bringing us to this point -- have the Rangers simply tuned their coaches out? At this point, it’s just hard to deny it.

It was weird when Marian Gaborik seemingly happily waived his no-trade to move from New York City to Columbus, and it’s been weird to see the Rangers simply appear to give up on playing their brand of hockey in this series. For coaches like Tortorella (and even Sullivan for those who recall his style in Boston), you can only scream, stomp, and explode before it becomes the status quo and loses your grip on the room.

But hey, don’t listen to me, just look at Sean Avery’s tweets.

(Don’t really look at his tweets.)

Ability of the Bruins’ fourth line to take it to Rangers without much resistance

One of the constants when it comes to the 2013 meetings between Boston and New York has been the excellent play of Boston’s fourth line against the Blueshirts.

Call ‘em the Merlot Line, the best fourth line in hockey, or whatever you’d like to, but they’ve become an undeniable line through three, and that’s the one that gets it all going for the Black-and-Gold. On the ice for both of the Bruins’ goals in Game 3, the trio’s ability to generate a strong cycling game while maintaining a strong net-front presence has been downright shocking given their skill-set, but a pivotal factor through three.

If you’re asking me, the Rangers -- perhaps focused too much on the Krejci and Bergeron line understandably so -- have used the Campbell as their ‘lax’ line, creating a “Oh, it’s just the Boston fourth line” mentality that’s ultimately led to numerous chances for that B’s line and beyond. Of course, this is a mere hunch, but there’s been a noticeably soft effort of resistance from New York’s on-ice squad when 20-11-22 come over those boards.

Henrik’s lack of timely saves, greater lack of accountability

This one’s a mere footnote in the grand scheme of things, but goaltender Henrik Lundqvist has looked like more of a damn loser every time a mic’s been stuck in his face throughout this series. Following Game 1, the 31-year-old netminder looked like the good soldier when he took the fall for the overtime goal from Brad Marchand that cleanly beat him. But then came a bit of ‘Well, it’s not just me’ from the Swede. He acknowledge that he hasn’t played poorly for the Rangers (which wasn’t wrong), and basically said that the team in front of him needs to be much better.

And in the next game, they were -- but my God, was Lundqvist not. Surrendering five goals on just 32 shots, ‘King Henrik’ opted to blame a defense that didn’t do enough to bail him out, noting that the traffic in his way all game long, and talking about the mistakes, miscues, and missteps that the skaters made. Then, on the heels of the club’s third straight loss, with the club facing elimination, Lundqvist came out and noted that the Bruins were only up in this series due to a ‘couple of bad bounces.’

Throughout this entire series, Lundqvist has been speaking to the media with a loser’s attitude. It’s not how you win a room over, and it’s not how you inspire confidence in your teammates. Any way but, in fact.

B’s withstood Rangers’ best in Game 3

Everybody in Boston knew that the Black-and-Gold were going to be punched in the face with the Rangers’ best when the puck dropped on Tuesday night. The Rangers didn’t want to go down 0-3, and in front of their fans, you were going to get a ridiculous effort. And when the Rangers weren’t penalized for what would’ve been a four-minute high-stick from captain Ryan Callahan, this one seemed to have the feel of a New York victory.

In layman's terms -- the Rangers were going to get their share of chances and fortunate breaks to make this a pleasant night on Broadway. But in a period that saw Lundqvist and company weather multiple storms from the B’s -- headlined by breakaway stops on both Chris Kelly and Tyler Seguin before stoning the 41-year-old Jaromir Jagr for the thousandth time in this series -- the Rangers couldn’t find any relief outside of a second period that featured their longest lead of the series thanks to Taylor Pyatt’s first of the series. The Rangers, clinging to the one-goal lead for dear life, were instead whooped into an 0-3 hole with goals from Johnny Boychuk and Danny Paille on top of a 23-save effort from Tuukka Rask.

Game 3 was supposed to be the best punch from the Rangers, and with nothin’ but another late-game collapse to brag about, it’s clear that the Bruins can and will hang with NY. And with another punch expected in Game 4, the B's have proved that they can deal with any 'statements' made by the Blueshirts, and now with the Rangers on their deathbed, it's all about the deathblow from Rask and company.

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