Winners & Losers From Bruins’ 5-Game Homestand

It was an eventful homestand for the Boston Bruins, to say the least. It began one week ago with an 8-1 thrashing by the Washington Capitals and ended with a 6-3 Bruins win over the same Caps. Two trades, four wins later, and the Black and Gold still holding onto the fourth and final East Division playoff berth.

There were plenty of storylines in the last seven days and there were plenty of winners and losers. Here are some of the winners and losers of the last seven days at the TD Garden.

Winners

Don Sweeney: Boston’s GM is the biggest winner of the last week when he worked late into the night last Sunday to acquire Mike Reilly from the Ottawa Senators, then he landed Taylor Hall and Curtis Lazar from the Buffalo Sabres. Sweeney was able to hold onto the B’s first-round pick in this July’s draft while upgrading his roster.

Bruce Cassidy: The Black and Gold’s bench boss got an offensive-minded left-shot defenseman in Reilly, a top-six forward in Hall, and what looks like a pretty darn good fourth-line center at his disposal.

Jeremy Swayman: The Bruins rookie goalie might be the biggest winner on the ice. The 22-year-old won his first career shootout Tuesday night when he stopped both of the attempts by the Sabres in a 3-2 win. Friday night, he made 25 saves for his first career shutout in a 3-0 victory over the New York Islanders. Not too bad.

Taylor Hall: Yeah, his first game wearing the Spoked-B was not great against his former team, but the next two against the Islanders were more of what the B’s are hoping to get from the former Hart Trophy winner. He scored his first Bruin goal in the third period of Thursday’s win, then he doubled the Bruins lead in the second period of Friday’s win over the Isles. In three games, he scored as many goals with the Bruins as he did with Buffalo in 37 games.

David Krejci: See above. Then Sunday, he scored two goals to up his total to four for the season. There’s a little extra step in his game since last Sunday night.

Losers

Buffalo Sabres: No, not for losing in a shootout Tuesday night, but for what happened late Sunday night. They sent Hall and Lazar to the Bruins for Anders Bjork and Boston’s second-round draft pick in July Entry Draft. The fans in Western New York think they could have got a better return for Hall and they might be right.

After a 4-1 homestand, the Bruins hit the road for three games this week in Buffalo and then two in Pittsburgh against the Penguins.