At around 10:30 p.m., in front of a rabid crowd of 17,565 at Boston’s TD Garden, Montreal’s Alex Galchenyuk killed the Boston Bruins’ 12-game winning streak. His weapon of choice? A filthy shootout goal in the bottom of the fourth, enough to seal the deal on a 2-1 victory for his Canadiens on the night and season series victory over their archrival Bruins, winning three of four this year.
But in a game that featured 34 minutes in penalties, a combined 60 hits, and needed a shootout to determine a winner, you can’t say you didn’t get your money’s worth when it came to the regular season finale between these two squads that well, uh, absolutely hate one another.
Still, to see such a strong stretch ended in a shootout against your biggest rival stings.
“Any game, to lose in a shootout sucks,… B’s netminder Tuukka Rask, who finished the night with 21 saves on 22 shots in the losing effort, admitted. “Still got a point, though.…
This one really started exactly how you’d imagine a late-season Habs vs. Bruins game to start: Montreal’s Alexei Emelin nailed Milan Lucic with a clean hipcheck at center ice, the B’s weren’t happy, so Zdeno Chara took a bad retaliatory penalty. That put Montreal on the power play not even two minutes into the first period. And to be honest, I’m not sure what the Bruins were expecting on that one. For one, the hit was clean. You see Johnny Boychuk put that hurt on people all the time. But this time (and perhaps the first time), Emelin got the better of Lucic. Secondly, it’s well known that Emelin (who has a metal plate in his face) cannot and will not fight. This should be known by the Black-and-Gold at this point, who found themselves in a similar situation last season when their captain went at Emelin after he nailed Tyler Seguin.
Surviving the Habs’ first power play opportunity, the Bruins would once again find themselves shorthanded when Kevan Miller was whistled for a crosscheck that sent Montreal’s Dale Weise crashing into the boards. Upset with the hit, Travis Moen opted to drop the gloves with the Bruins’ Miller in what was a complete demolition derby by No. 86.
Moen’s decision to go at Miller for the hit, wouldn’t negate the Canadiens’ power play, and it was a wrister from Emelin (though tipped by Boston’s Chris Kelly) at the end of the man-advantage that would give Montreal a 1-0 edge in Boston.
This was basically a recurring theme for the night, really.
At even-strength, the B’s really seemed to control the pace of play, but it was undisciplined mistakes throughout their lineup that seemed to put the Habs on the advantage time and time again.
“At times, absolutely,… Claude Julien said when asked if his team’s discipline was an issue tonight. “The [Brad] Marchand penalty was frustration because he got tripped on the faceoff before — it wasn’t called. Those are things that are gonna happen in a game and you can’t retaliate by taking a bad penalty [Johnny] Boychuk’s penalty was a bad one, but they didn’t score on those, so that’s not why we lost. But I think we have to be better disciplined against them.…
Through 40 minutes of play, the Bruins were shorthanded six (six!) times, down by a goal, and had zero goals on 21 shots against the Canadiens’ usual backup, Peter Budaj.
Something had to give.
Boston did nothing with a Tomas Plekanec penalty 43 seconds into the third. They did even less on a penalty against Douglas Murray six minutes after that. They struggled on a power-play just two minutes after that when Brendan Gallagher was whistled for one of the softest third period penalties you’ll see this year. But on the Habs’ fourth minor of the period, this one against Francis Bouillon for high-sticking Patrice Bergeron, No. 37 struck.
Scoring his 23rd goal of the season, his highest total since his 31-goal 2005-06 season, the Garden erupted and the Bruins’ bid to stretch the streak to 13 was alive. But when they just missed the mark late in regulation and in overtime, it was the shootout that proved to doom them. And maybe, just maybe, it was a rather unusual choice from Julien that seemed to backfire in the skills competition. In the top of the fourth and needing a goal, Julien put No. 46, David Krejci out there in search of the go-ahead marker. Krejci missed, and that’s really not a shock. He entered tonight 0-for-3 in shootouts this year, and went just 1-for-4 the year before. It’s not his game, at least not when you have guys like Loui Eriksson, Carl Soderberg, and Reilly Smith still on the bench as potential shooters.
Still, the Bruins nabbed a point, extending their point streak to 13 games. An impressive mark no matter the latest result. That’s 25 of a possible 26 points since March 2. Again, impressive.
And in the third period, when the Bruins needed one, they focused on what mattered.
“I thought that as the game went on we were battling and focusing on just playing the game. We were emotionally and physically attached. It’s always, obviously, a big game, every time we play Montreal,… Chara noted after the shootout loss. “But I thought that as the game went on we were obviously putting focus on playing the game instead of everything else. So, we did a pretty good job in the third and we got rewarded, finally, on the power play.…
And even after the 65-minute war between these two, the battle wasn't done just yet.
Still bothered by the early game hit, Lucic dished on what he thought about Emelin.
"If he wasn’t scared he’d stand up and hit me and not go after my knees, so it just shows how big of a chicken he is that he needs to go down like that to take me down, so it shows what kind of player he is, and on my end you’ve got to keep your guard up at all times," the Bruins' 6-foot-4 top-liner said after the game.
Emelin, who finished the night with four hits and two blocked shots in just under 23 minutes of ice-time tonight, opted not to speak with the media after the win.
Something tells you that these guys aren’t done with one another in 2013-14 though, right?
(Is going to absolutely hate the seven-game series these two teams will have in a month or so.)
Up next
Don’t worry, Bruins fans: If tonight’s game agitated you, the club’s next game against the Chicago Blackhawks should be relatively stress free. (Has flashback to last June.) Oh, damn it, nevermind.