Quite simply, Boston Bruins forward
Brad Marchand cannot be stopped.
In Boston’s third game back from the break, the 5-foot-9 forward that’s been on a season-long tear unlike any other, put the team on his back yet again, this time with an overtime penalty shot goal that sunk the Buffalo Sabres by a 2-1 final at TD Garden on Saturday night.
“Since [the suspension], he’s been a great player for us and he was coming up big in those situations. He’s thriving on it right now,” B’s coach
Claude Julien said of Marchand’s hot streak that’s included nine goals in the last nine games. “When you have a player like that on your team it’s comforting for everybody to know that he’ll come up big in those big situations. He’s riding a hot streak right now so you’ve got to ride it as long as you can and we can certainly use that.”
The Bruins scored first, 12:22 into the first period, behind
Loui Eriksson’s 16th goal of the season. Scored on a beautiful three-man, tic-tac-toe effort from Eriksson,
David Pastrnak, and center
David Krejci, the goal was a product of a turnover from Buffalo defenseman
Cody Franson, and courtesy of magnificent patience from No. 88 to find a net-front Eriksson.
“It was a great pass by Pastrnak there,” said Eriksson “It’s been a while since I’ve scored so it’s nice.”
The goal, Eriksson’s first in 10 games, held as the lone tally of the first period.
Buffalo answered back midway through the second period on
Sam Reinhart’s second in as many games, scored on a loose puck unable to be found by
Zdeno Chara.
But Reinhart’s strike wasn’t Chara’s fault, as the trouble came much earlier, when Marchand and
Brett Connolly were unable to push the puck up and out of their own zone just seconds before the goal (a frequent problem alluded to by
Claude Julien after Boston’s last home game, a 4-3 overtime loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs this past Tuesday).
“We love those beauty contests. So, this is one that I think we have to be happy with,” Marchand said. “We didn’t play our best game and it was back and forth, but ultimately we got the two points and right now every point is huge and hopefully we continue this momentum forward and continue to play well.”
As the third rang on with teams trading chances -- the best of Boston’s coming in a quick span that featured a Pastrnak iron-clanger and a great Robin Lehner stop on Jimmy Hayes -- the teams marched on to overtime for the second straight contest (and Boston’s third in as many post-break games).
And at the 2:32 mark of the overtime frame, with the B’s and Sabres deadlocked at 1-1, Boston’s break came with a penalty against
Rasmus Ristolainen for hooking Marchand on a breakaway.
Awarded a penalty shot for the second time this season, and with the Boston sellout crowd on their feet, No. 63 stormed down, beat Lehner, and roofed home his 24th goal of the season.
The Sabres, who were not awarded a penalty shot on a similar incident with
Jamie McGinn and
Dennis Seidenberg late in the third period of a tied game, were understandably upset with the call against Ristolainen on Marchand and noncall of the aforementioned McGinn-Seidenberg play earlier.
“We’re talking about a sequence of events of Jamie McGinn having, it’s not even a similar play, it’s a guy leaving his feet, taking him down on a breakaway,” Buffalo coach
Dan Bylsma noted. “I think there’s some interference on Zach Bogosian that allows Torey Krug to have a breakaway, and there’s no separation on the last play. Rasmus [Ristolainen] is right there with him, and the judgment of the referee awards a penalty shot, and I’m not sure I see it the same way.”
Lehner, who made 36 saves in the losing effort, echoed Bylsma’s thoughts.
“Honestly I’m not even disappointed that we lost, I’m disappointed [pauses]. If I say something now I’m going to get in [trouble] you know? That’s what is disappointing, you know? We have [Jamie] McGinn going down, he’s three yards ahead of what [Brad] Marchand was and he was clipped. He didn’t get anything,” Lehner said. “Marchand, he does what he does, you know? It wasn’t even a penalty. He [referee] calls a penalty after a game like that, it’s just – I’m an honest guy and I thought that was – I mean like both of those refs are good refs, don’t get me wrong, but that was, oh my God, I don’t know what to say man. That’s just embarrassing. I hope he’s embarrassed. I am embarrassed – it shouldn’t end like that. Disappointing thing is that I might get fined or whatever, but it’s just embarrassing.”
Deserved or not, Marchand’s goal marked the first time in franchise history that the Bruins won a game on an overtime penalty shot. It was his second penalty shot goal of the year, too.
The Bruins have now taken three out of four head-to-head meetings with Buffalo.
Random thoughts and notes
- The big change in this game was the flip back into the lineup for
Joe Morrow after four games as a healthy scratch and consequent scratch for
Colin Miller. With Morrow, a left-shooting d-man, back in action, the Bruins moved
Dennis Seidenberg on over to the right side of his usual second pairing (a spot previously occupied by Miller). You saw at different points where this hurt the Bruins in a way, such as late in the third period when Morrow sent a cross-point pass to Seidenberg that forced Seidenberg to go to his backhand and muddy the positive traction the B’s had made.
All in all, though, a solid return to action for the 23-year-old Alberta native.
“It’s a fun game to play in, it’s no fun sitting in the stands,” Morrow said after his first game since Jan. 23. “You can practice all you want, but nothing’s like a gametime scenario.”
In 17:17 of time on ice (24 shifts), Morrow pushed pace and put two shots on net.
“He played a very solid game,” Seidenberg, who has had a revolving door of pairing partners this year, said of Morrow’s game. “Skated really well, moving the puck up, got shots through, and closed quick in our zone. That’s all you can ask from a D that hasn’t played in a while. He did a great job.”
- As the roster begins to take its pre-deadline shape (at least up front, that is) after five months of shifting about, the Bruins sent
Joonas Kemppainen down to the American Hockey League on Friday. The move wasn’t exactly a surprise given Kemppainen’s general sort of ineffectiveness at the NHL level of late, but still showed that the B’s didn’t exactly seem keen on having him just sit as a perma-scratch in their NHL press box (like they’ve done with
Tyler Randell). And in his first game with the P-Bruins on Friday night (against the Albany Devils), Kemppainen did … nothing. This has to be absolutely maddening for a player that led the Finnish League playoffs in scoring a year ago.
Prior to his send down, Kemppainen had gone 16 games without registering a point, had just one in his last 29 games played, and was a healthy scratch in Boston’s overtime loss to the Leafs on Tuesday.
“I think he just needs to get some confidence there offensively because his numbers have been good in the past, so just give him a chance to go out there and play and maybe help himself out that way and get some confidence,” Julien said of Kemppainen’s demotion to the minors. “Other than that, we’ve appreciated his consistency on faceoffs and his defensive play. And his penalty killing has been extremely good so, you know, for him to just give us a little bit of offense there, maybe we send him there since he’s not playing and he’ll gain a little bit of confidence there.”
Up Next
The Bruins are off until Tuesday night when they welcome
Milan Lucic and the Los Angeles Kings to TD Garden. This will of course be Lucic’s first time back in Boston as a visitor since being traded by the club back in June 2015. In the midst of a solid contract with LA, the 6-foot-4 Lucic has 12 goals and 30 points in 50 games for the Kings. Expect a huge, huge ovation and video tribute for No. 17.
Ty Anderson has been covering the National Hockey League for HockeyBuzz.com since 2010, has been a member of the Pro Hockey Writers Association's Boston Chapter since 2013, and can be contacted on Twitter, or emailed at Ty.AndersonHB[at]gmail.com. 
Boston Bruins Blogger •Bruins Feature Columnist • 
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