Bruins Have Owned the Penguins Recently at TD Garden

Over the last couple of seasons, the Boston Bruins have been one of the top teams not only in the Atlantic Division, but also in the Eastern Conference. During that time, they have gone toe-to-toe with the other contending teams and have had a lot of success.

The Pittsburgh Penguins have been a team that has done traditionally well in the regular season, but has gone through their share of playoff frustration and failures. The Bruins and Pens have only played a couple of times in the regular season because they were in different divisions prior to this season.

Pittsburgh has had success in the Metropolitan Division, but this season, the NHL went with new realigned divisions for the regular season to limit travel during the coronavirus pandemic. The Bruins and Penguins are East Division foes for the 2021 season and will meet eight times. Four games in Boston and four games in the Steel City.

Bruins have had plenty of success against the Penguins at home recently.

Tuesday night was the first of four matchups between the Bruins and Penguins at the TD Garden in 2021. Boston took a 2-0 lead into the third period, only to have Pittsburgh rally to tie the game and send it to overtime.

In overtime, the Bruins did what they have done to Sidney Crosby and the Penguins in recent years, they won the game at the TD Garden over the Pens.

Craig Smith scored with 11 seconds left in overtime for a 3-2 victory that was the Black and Gold’s ninth consecutive victory over the Penguins in the friendly confines to the TD Garden.

If you sit back and think about it, this is an incredible stat. It’s not that the Penguins have been a doormat team in the league. They have been one of the better teams in not only the conference, but also in the league.

Pittsburgh entered last night’s game, winners of four in a row, and in each game, they were either tied or trailing entering the third period. When they tied the game in the third period, they thought they were sitting pretty against the Bruins, until Smith scored to avoid the dreaded shootout.

The Bruins will play the Penguins one more time tonight at the TD Garden to close out their season-opening, four-game homestand before hitting the road again. Boston could be missing some key pieces in the lineup, but they do enter the game on a nine-game home winning streak against the Penguins and confidence as winners of three straight games.