By Kate Joseph
Staff Writer
The Boston Bruins started off their season strong by winning their first two games of the season last week.
Thursday night marked the regular season opener for Boston when they faced the Tampa Bay Lightning finishing off with a score of 3-1. The Bruins hit the ice again on Saturday night to defeat the Detroit Red Wings ending the game at 4-1.
Game one began slow until Chris Kelly was able to score for Boston with a fake out shot 11 minutes into the first period. Tampa Bay tied up the score in the second period, but Boston pushed ahead shortly after when Milan Lucic scored with assistance from David Krejci.
Four minutes into the third period, Boston scored their third goal, a wrist shot by Patrice Bergeron, finalizing the score for the remainder of the game.
With 15 blocked shot attempts in the first period, goaltender Tuuka Rask was one of the most valuable players of the game. “Tuuka’s been Tuuka, he’s just been solid, well played, made the big saves when we need him,” coach Claude Julien told the Boston Globe. “In that first game, I thought he did a good job of holding us in there when we didn’t have a good start. Last game, I thought we had a much better overall game, but against that type of team, you need good goaltending and he gave us that.”
Boston and Detroit both got some action in the first period of game two. Torey Krug, new to the Bruins roster, scored his first goal of his professional NHL career with assistance from Lucic and Krejci. The Red Wings scored with a quick wrist shot at the end of the second period to bring the score to a tie.
Boston dominated the second and third periods with another three goals, breaking away from the 1-1 tie.
Johnny Boychuk assisted Brad Marchand who made a wrist shot on Detroit bringing the score to 2-1. A similar play made by newcomer Jordan Caron with assistance from Reilly Smith and Adam McQuaid put the Bruins ahead by two at the end of the third period.
Captain Zdeno Chara finished out the 4-1 game with a backhand shot with assistance from Krug and Lucic.
“I think as a team we got better through the first game,” Rask told the Boston Globe of the team’s gameplay so far this season. “And the last game against Detroit was a really good example of how we need to play.”
Though Boston has dominated their first two games, Krug insists the team still has a long road ahead of them. “There’s so many things that we have to continue to work on to get better,” the newcomer told NHL.com. “It’s a process; it doesn’t just happen. We have to work on it, continue work on it, even if we have success, we can’t stop practicing it. Hopefully each game we can bring something to the table.”
The Bruins currently hold second place in the NHL standings with a 2-0 record, just behind the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Catch the Bruins again on Thursday Oct. 10, at 7 p.m. as they battle the Colorado Avalanche at the Garden.
