Boston Bruins: Leaving The Winter Classic Behind

The Boston Bruins have decided to step on the gas, and leave their Winter Classic woes in the rear view mirror.  The Bruins are still a little stung from their disappointing 5-1 performance against their most ancient rivals, the Montreal Canadiens. The team was all business as they went through a Sunday practice at the TD Garden. The Black and Gold know they’ve got to move on, and the best way to do that is to push ahead as fast as possible.

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The Bruins know they’ve got to move on. As far as they’re concerned, it’s a new chapter for the Bruins as of now.

“I’m done talking about this last month,” said Claude Julien. “It’s been a month that we’ve grinded through, and we’re done here. So it’s about moving forward and not even talking about it. So that’s what we’ve done today — we’ve talked about our team moving forward, here.”

Claude Julien knows he’s got to refocus his team. The Bruins have lost four of their last five games, and he needs his young players to be ready for the second half of the season. The Bruins are currently fourth in the Atlantic, and in the last playoff slot in the Eastern Conference.

“I think we just move on here,” said Coach Claude Julien after this morning’s practice. “We really grinded it out over the last month, and now it’s over. So it’s about moving forward and not even talking about it. That’s what we talked about with the team…just moving forward here. It’s good to put [the Winter Classic] hype behind us. I think it’s important to put those things behind us, and to move forward here. It was a hectic month. I thought we had some pretty good success, but it was hectic with all that was going on around us.

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“We’ve had a lot of players in and out with injuries at different positions, so we thought we’d take today to really tidy up some things up in the defensive zone, and make sure we’re a little more in tune, I guess. So that’s what we worked on.”

Bruins defenseman Colin Miller was part of today’s defensive drills, even though he wasn’t at fault. Mostly because he didn’t take part in the Winter Classic. With Marchand’s suspension, and the temporary additions of Alexander Khokhlachev and Seth Griffith (who are already back in Providence), required the moving of a defenseman. That meant Colin Miller would be demoted just before one of the biggest potential games of the season.

It was disappointing the Miller had to be taken off the team. Miller is currently third in scoring among defensemen and has been reliable more often than not for Boston. Miller’s entry-level contract was the main reason for his demotion, but it still left a lot of Bruins fans questioning the move. Miller’s speed could have been used to blunt Montreal’s continual presence in the offensive zone, but the decision was made and Miller went down to Providence.

“I was there [in Providence]. It is what it is,” offered Miller about his ill-timed demotion. “Don [Sweeney] explained to me that it was a roster thing, and that stuff is going to happen. It was frustrating. It was a crappy time, and a crappy thing to happen no matter what time of the year it is whether it’s [the Winter Classic] or not. I don’t know. You move on and look forward to the games coming, and hopefully getting back into the lineup.”

“I think I kind of knew at the beginning of this season that there was a chance that could happen. It is what it is, and you move on. It’s part of being a pro, and it’s part of the season. You just have to deal with it especially with [an entry-level] contract it’s going to happen. It was a rough couple of days, and now you move on to the games.”

I guess this means the new code word among Bruins fans when discussing the Winter Classic will be ‘Voldemort’.