Boston Bruins: Top 3 heroes against Winnipeg Jets
The Boston Bruins took on a tired Winnipeg Jets side on Thursday night, but that’s not to say they had an easy path to an eventual 5-4 victory.
In fact, the Boston Bruins spent large chunks of this game trailing the Jets on every one of their 4 goals. We certainly chose to do this the hard way in that regard, chasing the lead again and again.
However, when all was said and done, we came away with a valuable two points, which are vital in retaining the Atlantic Division lead and thus hopefully an easier first-round opponent in the play-offs.
When Kyle Connor gave the Jets a lead just seven minutes into the night, you did have to wonder whether this was going to be another of those missed opportunities for the Boston Bruins. They didn’t let that happen though and David Pastrnak evened things up before the first period ended.
A steady parade of players to the penalty box made for an interesting second period, with Andrew Copp first taking advantage of a Winnipeg power play before Pastrnak did the same for Boston. Jake Debrusk then grabbed a lead before Neal Pionk evened things up with Matt Grzelcyk sitting for an interference call.
The third period followed the same trend, albeit with less penalty box action; Mark Shiefele gave the Jets a 4-3 lead 7 minutes in, but Pastrnak countered with a hat-trick goal before DeBrusk completed his strong night adding the game winner for his second on the night.
There were certainly some less than impressive performances, but for the most part the Boston Bruins came out standing tall. A late scratching of Zdeno Chara saw them play with a less than optimum defensive group and can go some way to explaining the 4 goals conceded.
In all honesty though, a lot of it is the simple fact that the Winnipeg Jets aren’t a pushover side. They are in fact quite an attacking dynamo when they get going. Without further ado though, here are our three stand-out performers for the Boston Bruins:
3. Torey Krug
Torey Krug may seem like an odd choice as one of the Boston Bruins’ heroes in this game, especially when you have the likes of Jake Debrusk and David Pastrnak notching multi-point nights and David Krejci coming away with a +3 plus/minus score.
However, Krug deserves a mention given that he was a last-minute decision as he was suffering from a flu bug in the lead-up to last night’s fixture.
To come through a game while suffering flu symptoms isn’t unheard of, but to do so while registering the second-most ice-time among defensemen, even if 5:07 of this was on the power play, shows real strength of character.
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Not only did he play through his symptoms, but he also managed to tally an assist and come away clean in terms of a 0 plus/minus score.
Per Natural Stat Trick, only Chris Wagner and Brandon Carlo laid more hits, with Krug also managing to draw a penalty on the night for the Boston Bruins.
At even strength, only Chris Wagner had a better Corsi For percentage than Krug’s elite 66.67%, especially considering he played 8:16 more than Wagner. His Fenwick score and Shots For percentages also paint a picture of a dominant performance from the defenseman.
The Winnipeg Jets are no walk in the park by any stretch of the imagination, but Torey Krug, whether by luck or more likely due to the strength of his defensive efforts, was only on the ice when the Jets scored 1 of their 4 goals.
Krug was a hero in regards to playing on through illness and doing so without letting his usual high standards drop. He was duly rewarded with an assist in David Pastrnak’s power-play marker.
2. Jake DeBrusk
All things equal, Jake DeBrusk has been stuck in a rut this season. Even after this game, he’s still only managed 24 points in 40 games. While that does put him right on track to match his previous season’s totals, we have always held out the hope that there’s more to him.
The reason for that level of expectation was plain to see against the Winnipeg Jets; DeBrusk put away 2 goals (including the game-winning goal) as well as notching an assist. He was very much in-form and could easily have grabbed a hat-trick with a little more luck and a tiny bit more ice-time!
The sheer fact that coming into the game he’d managed just 1 point in his last 4 games makes a three-point night stand-out just that little bit more.
His unassisted effort late in the second period was particularly impressive, forcing a Jets turnover by pinching on the sidewall and speeding off on the break away, before going top-shelf past Laurent Brossoit in the Winnipeg net:
Engine ignited. 🔥 @JDebrusk | #NHLBruins pic.twitter.com/cNO06AQ2hl
— Boston Bruins (@NHLBruins) January 10, 2020
His game-winner, whilst impressive in it’s own right, wasn’t quite on the same level, though it did show an impressive amount of hand-eye coordination for him to deflect Charlie McAvoy‘s shot from the point home:
#CELLYSZN for the win.@JDebrusk | #NHLBruins pic.twitter.com/LJ9C9bvCLE
— Boston Bruins (@NHLBruins) January 10, 2020
All in all, this was exactly the kind of heroic performance that DeBrusk needed. Hopefully he finds his feet once more and can use this three-point outing as fuel to push on to bigger and better things in the second half of this campaign.
1. David Pastrnak
The stand-out performance of the night came from the by now usual suspect, David Pastrnak. In netting a hat-trick, he took sole possession of the hat-trick scoring leaderboard in the NHL this season with 3.
That slots him ahead of former Boston Bruins teammate Noel Acciari, scoring leader Connor McDavid and the likes of James Neal and Evander Kane with their 2 each.
This isn’t the first, nor will it be the last time this season that David Pastrnak grabs the bull by the horns and ensures a Boston Bruins win. Each of his three goals were tying goals, ensuring the Bruins weren’t spending a whole game seeking to come from behind.
In all, they spend 16 minutes (thereabouts) behind in the game, before each time Pastrnak put the puck home. While it means he won’t get any credit with a game-winning goal, he is without doubt the game-winner on the night, as those comeback goals would’ve galvanised his teammates and pushed their energy levels.
His performance on the night sees his current point streak extended to 12 games, with 9 goals and 10 assists over that period.
He has a much stronger grip on the Rocket Richard scoring lead now as well as still very much being in the hunt for the Art Ross Trophy too! You’d also expect considerable votes in the Hart Trophy stakes at this rate.
There’s so much to love about David Pastrnak’s performance every night; on this night, hat-trick number three for the year and number eight in his Boston Bruins’ career was more than enough reason to see him named our hero!
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