Game 79: Bruins @ Rangers 7:30 PM ON VERSUS

Not much at stake tonight except pride and feeling out a possible 1st-round matchup.

I love that picture of torts up there.

Rangers' magic number is 5 but with a win tonight, I think they eliminate Toronto.

Stats!

GO BRUINS!

Game 78: Bruins vs. Thrashers THE RETURN OF THE AMERICANS

Well we've recently played some teams from Canada so there's been a lot of talk about the USA USA USA chant these days. Today is of course the return of half the Bruins' American players this year - Blake Wheeler and Mark Stuart. Since the trade, Blake's taken off, currently tied for scoring through the last ten ATL games. No word on whether he started hitting.

The Bruins magic number (to clinch the division) is

Cool thing I saw today: Playoff matchup probabilities

Oh and the upside of that leafs game was Brad Marchand stealing the puck and burying it behind Reimer...for his 5th Shorty of the season. He's having a huge year, I hope we can afford re-signing him and Kaberle. No time to worry about that now, though. Here's the goal, it ruled:

Stats!

GO BRUINS!

Game 77: Toronto @ Boston BRUINS CAN CLINCH TONIGHT

Yup, it's the leafs again. For the last time all year.

It's been quite the run, from one of Seguin's only home goals:

To the acquisition of one Tomas Kaberle, Esq.

And some Waffles:

Not really a whole lot left to say about it all at this point.

Stats!

Everything's in our favor but Powerplay Opportunities and record over the last 10 games.

Trap game, big time.

A win tonight clinches the division. Remember crushing New Jersey's dreams? That ruled.

Make them cry.

GO BRUINS!

Game 76: Bruins v. Blackhawks

The game tonight is on Versus at 7:30pm, a concession for Chicago fans (and games starting at 7pm.) This is a different team than the one that won the cup last year but the important pieces are still there. Beatable but not easily so.

Stats!

Second-best PP in the league, behind Vancouver. 6th-worst PK. Should be interesting.

The magic number to win the division is 6.

GO BRUINS!

Game 73: Habs @ Bruins RIVALRY

Big rivalry game tonight. Nothing to do about it except go lose your voice at the game.

You should know the storylines by now. I really don't have to write much of anything at all.

Stats!

Feels like days until puck drop.

Habs suck but 4 habs fans doesn't, check them out.

Bruins magic number is 7 to clinch a playoff berth, 14 to clinch the division.

GO BRUINS!

Game 72: Devils @ Bruins TEN GAMES LEFT

Tough draw tonight. Devils need to basically win every game from here on out to make the playoffs. Jacques Lemaire is making a run to get the Jack Adams renamed. He's got the Devils in serious trap mode. They're letting up very very few shots. The last 2 games they let 12 and 13 shots get to Brodeur.

Will luck change? I certainly hope so. Players to watch for: Kovalchuk, Patrick Elias, Travis Zajac, Jacob Josefson, and Brian Rolston have all played a large part in the scoring. So watch out.

Stats!

Magic number is still 9.

Habs 1 point behind, hosting Buffalo tonight. GO BUFFALO!

GO BRUINS!

Game 70: Bruins @ Smashville ST. PATRICE BERGERON-CLEARY

Nashville fans gonna complain and say Shea Weber is a better defenseman than Zdeno Chara but I don't see him breaking hardest-shot records or winning the Norris, so hmph.

Pekka Rinne is also first loser on the save percent leaderboard this year, and has been hot as .931 goaltending can be, so pretty much assume he's a brick wall. Thomas has a .938 in the Bruins' last 10 games. Rask weighs in at only .929 aka "still amazing." If it's not a goalie duel tonight then something funny is in the air and I don't mean leprechauns or green beer.

Patrick Hornqvist is trying to pass Andy Brickley as highest-scoring last-overall pick of all time. He's got 92 points in 175 games. Brickley had 222 points in 385 games as a defenseman. Brickley's got a better career pace but Hornqvist might play more games. He had a great year last year but has tapered off. We'll see whether he gets another 130+ points.

On the whole I think the Preds are a pretty cool team.

Marchand's probably suspended but I'm not sure yet since the NHL is taking it's sweet time with the hearing.

Stats!

Yeah, you could say I'm worried.

Don't expect to see a lot (if any) powerplay time for the Bruins tonight.

GO BRUINS!

Game 69: Bruins @ Columbus

Yup, Blue Jackets on a tuesday. Nothing to get excited about, right? Well, let's not be so sure.

For one, the Bruins are in the midst of a 4-game losing slump and that sucks, so of course watching them on TV will help them break on through. Columbus introduced and mothballed a new mascot, Boomer, this year. Feel free to check out Boomer's backstory on Sports Argument Wiki. Great stuff.

Game's at 7 on NESN, see you there.

STATS!

Generally I find that if the Bruins win every stat column, it's not promising for that night's game.

Welp.

GO BRUINS!

Bruins V. Lightning

First home game in a while. Should be a good game. Two division leaders, one with the high-flying offense of St. Louis and Stamkos and Lecavelier and the other with more goals for per game. Owned.

However the Lightning have gone from a -6 goal differential and leading their division to an even goal differential and leading their division. They're improving ever since they got Dwayne "a real goalie" Roloson.

The winner of tonight's game is second in the conference tomorrow.

GO BRUINS!

Game 18 Preview: Kings at Bruins BEAT LA BEAT LA BEAT LA

Apparently the NHL schedule makers really enjoy the Boston/LA matchup since we doubled with them last year and are doubling with them again this year. The game in LA is in January and is Czech/Slovak pride night. Cool. Also cool: the Kings are doing "Legends nights" this year where they wear old-school jerseys and celebrate 40 years. One of their legends nights is against the Wild but that's neither here nor there. Here's the old-school jersey:

Yeah, not too shabby. Especially on Drew Doughty

So here's hoping for a good win.

Stats!

Both teams are playing pretty well so far this season, with LA sitting atop their division and the Bruins having one of the best points percentages in the league. It's all going to come down to whether the Bruins want to extend their 3-game win streak more than LA wants to stop their 3-game losing slide. Should be a good one.

GO BRUINS!

Game 17 Preview: Bruins V. Panthers NO YOU SHOULDN'T BOO WIDEMAN YOU IDIOT

NESN, 7pm, Home game, 98.5 FM, you know the drill.

Last year's top playoff scorer for the Bruins is going to get booed and it's going to be stupid. Kinda hope he gets a hat trick in a 4-3 Bruins win, honestly.

They played in the preseason, this happened:

Fly, little water bottle. FLY!

Stats!

Not a lot of time for this (or any) post, but look at that FLA PP%! They also take the fewest penalties in the league. Top scorer is Frolik with 11, and then 2nd-best scorers (10 points) are Dennis Wideman, David Booth, Marty Reasoner, and Brian McCabe. Horton, Lucic, and Recchi are all outscoring the Florida top scorer.

GO BRUINS!

Game 10 Preview: Washington AGAIN?

This whole "playing the Caps" thing is starting to get old already. Just kidding, so far it's been great. Here are some pics from the previous 2 WSH/BOS games. Click on them for bigger versions. Enjoy.

Stats!

Remember when the Caps PK hadn't let in any goals?

Totally mailed it in today, I'm pretty busy.

GO BRUINS!

Game 5 Preview: HOME, HOME ON THE RINK

Okay, folks. You know how it do. The Bruins are on a hot streak, having won the last 3 games against Phoenix, New Jersey, and Washington after dropping the international home opener to Phoenix in Prague. You can see pictures of the Prague games in the next post, but I'm not here to dwell on the past.

I'm here to point out how goddamn badass Thomas's white-as-snow pads look. No, really, check this out:

(click for huge, also looks like some doan-face action)

Thomas has been posting ridiculous goalie numbers right now, including against some elite competition. Like Ilya Kovalchuk:

Gotta love Jack.

So basically Thomas owns right now and all the haters are climbing over themselves to get back on the Thomas bandwagon. Which is dumb, since rooting for a specific goalie instead of the team is just silly. Tuukka starts tonight, and if he lets up more than a goal I fully expect some assholes to boo him for no good reason. For more on that, go check out Day's of Y'Orr's excellent post about it.

No really. Go read it. I'll wait.

Did you read it yet? No? Here's the link again: CLICK HERE.

Okay, now we can continue.

The Caps are obviously looking to prove they're not a bad team and can beat the Bruins like they did all last year. The Bruins are out to prove they're not completely lost and alone and hopeless on the powerplay. The Caps haven't let up a PPG yet. DRAMA! INTRIGUE!

Oh, and I know I didn't write about the Bergeron and Chara extensions, but basically my thought is that I'm happy to have those 2 guys back, and the Chara one might be a little long...maybe. He works out like a maniac, so it might work fine. Then again maybe not. Who knows? And now you know why I'm not an NHL GM.

Now, here are some stats:

Horrible Jerk who should really pick it up, jeez:

Tyler Seguin is a -1 and has only 2 points in his first 4 NHL games.

Keep your head up and your stick down, kids.

GO BRUINS!

GAME 1: LET'S MAKE IT A SERIES TONIGHT

Feel free to check out the series preview at any of these places:

• here
• Stanley Cup of Chowder
• Die By The Blade
• Puck Daddy

It all goes out the window when the puck drops anyhow. There's a saying in playoff hockey, "The series doesn't start until someone loses at home."

Let's start the series tonight.

GO BRUINS!

Game 71 Preview: Bruins vs. Rangers WHO DOESN'T LIKE MORNING HOCKEY

Ugh, it's too early for a proper preview. Both teams are bad. Gaborik is good. Avery's been playing well, but too boring. Here's hoping he does something really dumb on national TV, and it doesn't help the Rangers.

Here's hoping you're going and not "Golding out the garden" like SCoC suggested.

Game at 12:30 on NBC of all channels.

Frolunda is still alive in the playoffs, and Axelsson should come back soon for them. They're 1-1 in a seven-game series right now.

Game 70: Bruins vs. Penguins: FRED STANFIELD PARTY

This isn't a game preview because this game has been talked about for the last since-savard-had-to-sit-in-a-dark-quiet-room and I frankly am going to just sit back and enjoy the ride if possible.

This night is supposed to honor the 1970 cup team.

Dammit, I intend to do that. First of all, because you all know how much I love the numbers:
Here's the link to the Hockey-reference page, check it out.

Of interest first is the goaltending. In the regular season, the duties were split pretty evenly, 41/37 between Johnston and Cheevers. They didn't count shots in those days, but Cheevers' GAA was better than Johnston's:
And then Cheevers gets almost all the starts for the playoffs. Johnston has 1 start, 60 minutes, 4 goals against, and no wins. Like the Red Wings' Hasek in 2008. Cheevers was lights out, giving up just as many losses as one-game Johnston and riding a 2.23 GAA to 12 wins and the cup.I'm sure the scoring does something interesting too, like for example the top scorers on the team change between the regular season:
And the playoffs:
Espo and Orr switch, as do McKenzie and Bucyk. Number 5 on both lists, behind 3 hall-of-famers and some schlub named John McKenzie was Fred Stanfield, who most people probably wouldn't know on the street (especially 40 years later, but whatever.) Here's a quick write-up about Fred from excellent hockey history blogger, Joe Pelletier:

"It's true we move the puck around pretty well," said Stanfield when describing his line's play. "I can make soft passes or hard ones. With guys who can go like Chief and Pie, I throw it to them real hard. They can reach them, and it gives them more time to make the play. We keep the passes off the ice and that's to our advantage because the puck doesn't get blocked by anybody's stick that way."

More here on Fred Stanfield.

It was a hell of a team, I tell you what. Here's the page on the Bruins website detailing the full list of attendees, past and present. Thanks to a generous gift (thanks mom!) I'm lucky enough to go. Hell yeah.

Here's the story in some famous and less-famous pictures:

I think it'll be at least a year if not 2 from now before we're anywhere close to this type of elation again, but I'm a pessimist.

Interesting note: Despite being one of the worse original six teams through most of the league's history, the Bruins are still in the top 5 of all-time stanley cups, and only behind habs, Toronto, and Detroit of the original six.

Suck our tailpipe, Chicago and New York.

The funny thing is one of the least popular men in Boston is named after one of the (at one time) most popular men. A man who answered "a blond and a steak" to "what's your favorite pre-game meal." A man who set up The Goal. A man named Derek Sanderson. And a man named after him, Derek Sanderson Jeter.

Fuck the Yankees, too.

Now, on to some shitty things. This man:is Colin Campbell,
who thinks that Intent to Injure isn't a penalty in itself, but can only be tacked on to other penalties.

Now, I'm not telling you to do something stupid and get arrested, but I am saying that

Colin Campbell will be in the building tonight.

That's right, in the building.

So stay calm and don't get yourself arrested, but boo the shit out of his ugly mug if he shows up on the jumbotron. He's doing a great job of "but my hands are tied, I can't POSSIBLY do anything about this hit since it's the same as the Richards one from last year that I fucked up and didn't suspend Richards for because he's a star" and turning Ovechkin into the next Pronger.

Whatever.

Stats!

GO BRUINS!