Looking to finish their three-game road trip perfect, the Boston Bruins suffered their first regulation loss in nine days to the Philadelphia Flyers at the Wells Fargo Center Saturday afternoon.
Philadelphia kept their playoff hopes alive and climbed within four points of the Bruins with a hard-fought, 3-2, victory. Here are some takeaways from the Bruins’ final game of the 2021 season against the Flyers, where they won six out of the eight contests.
Bruins takeaways
- Philadelphia came into the game with the league’s 29th-ranked penalty kill, but the Bruins failed to score on all four of their chances. Moving forward, the Black and Gold need to fix this problem and find production with the man advantage.
- What didn’t help on the power play Boston losing Matt Grzelcyk with an upper body in the first period. Coach Bruce Cassidy used a five-forward PP in Grzelcyk’s absence without any success. The Bruins have an issue on defense against the Washington Capitals tomorrow night at home. Charlie McAvoy will be out again and Kevan Miller is not available on the back-to-back. Can’t wait to see how well this works out against the Caps.
UPDATE: Matt Grzelcyk (upper body) will not return to today's game. #NHLBruins
— Boston Bruins (@NHLBruins) April 10, 2021
- The Bruins outshot the Flyers, 7-0, for the first 8:30 of the game and had a 1-0 lead on a Patrice Bergeron goal. After Philly tied it on a Travis Konecny goal, a needless penalty on Jeremy Lauzon late in the period led to a Philadelphia power play goal. That power play goal was the difference in the game.
- Swayman suffered his first loss of the season after two impressive performances on the road trip. Konecny’s goal was off a rebound, Shayne Gostisbehere’s power play goal was a tip-in and the game-winning goal from Sean Couturier was not his fault. The Flyers set up a nice triangle to the right of the goal, while four of the five Bruins on the ice were on the left side.
- Jake DeBrusk found the back of the net for the Bruins in the second period. Since returning from his 17-day COVID-19 quarantine, he actually has not played too bad. He buried a nice wrist shot off a pass from Craig Smith midway through the middle period.
- Speaking of Smith, he picked two assists and now has three goals and nine assists in his last 11 games.
The Bruins return home tomorrow night to begin a five-game homestand against the Capitals. This is an opportunity for them to gain more ground in the race for the fourth and final East Division playoff spot.