Boston Bruins: The Good, Bad & Ugly From a 1-0 Win Over the Rangers
The Boston Bruins won their second consecutive game in 48 hours over the New York Rangers with a 1-0 victory at Madison Square Garden Friday night. Two nights after winning 3-2 in overtime, the Bruins were able to grind out a win over a Rangers team that has struggled early in the season putting the puck in the net.
Boston won their 10th game of the season in just game No. 13. Let’s take a look at some of the good, and, ugly from the Bruins’ shutout victory.
The Good
- Jaroslav Halak earned his 51st shutout in his career as he stopped all 21 Rangers’ shots, including 10 in the first period to improve to 4-0-1 this season. His best save was in the first period when New York’s No. 1 draft pick in October pick Alexis Lafreniere batted the puck out of the air, but Halak, sliding side to side, was able to flash out the right pad to make the save.
- Prior to the game, I wrote about how the Bruins needed to get secondary scoring from someone, anyone, and Nick Ritchie provided it in the second period for the game’s only goal. Ritchie broke down the right side and flipped a backhander on net that Rangers goalie Igor Shesterkin stopped. The rebound found its way back to Ritchie and he was able to bank it into the net from behind the goal line off of Sherterkin’s back.
- The Bruins penalty killing has been very good lately and it was again Friday night. Boston killed off all six Rangers opportunities, including a 6-on-4 for the final 1:02 of the game when Charlie McAvoy was called for a delay of game after flipping the puck straight into the empty stands. Brandon Carlo and Kevan Miller killed most of the time along the boards behind the Bruins net by pining the puck along the boards to run out the clock.
The Bad
- A pair of Bruins had personal point streaks snapped in the victory. Marchand had a nine-game point streak of seven goals and six assists broken, while McAvoy had an eight-game point streak of one goal and 10 assists snapped.
- Early in the season, the Bruins were a dominant team in the first period. The last two games against the Rangers have left a lot to be desired in the opening 20 minutes. After playing a dismal first period Wednesday night with just six shots on net, Friday night was not much better. Boston was outshot 10-6 and once again outplayed. Thanks to Halak, the game was scoreless heading into the first intermission.
The Ugly
- For the third straight game, the Bruins power play went scoreless. New York killed all four opportunities for the Black and Gold and now have killed 21 straight chances against their opponents. The Rangers did a good job of taking David Pastrnak and his famed slap shot away and they also took away Patrice Bergeron in the bumper. The Bruins can’t get frustrated as they have way too much talent to be kept down for a long time.
- While the Bruins penalty kill was outstanding, they were put into some bad positions with some self-inflicted penalties. McAvoy and Connor Clifton each were called for delay of game for sending the puck out of play. McAvoy, one of the Bruins’ better penalty killers, took two third period penalties. Aside from his delay of game minor in the final minute, he was whistled for a tripping penalty earlier in the period.
More. Patrice Bergeron off to dominant start in 2021. light
All in all, the Bruins found enough offense thanks to Ritchie, and their penalty killing was on top of its game to survive the struggling Rangers for the second time in two games to leave Manhattan with four points.