Bruins Are Off To A Hot Start

The Boston Bruins are undefeated so far on their young season. A perfect 3-0 on their road trip to start the season, beating the Stars, Coyotes and Golden Knights. They’ve outscored their opponents 7-4 and really found their offense last night against the Golden Knights and dug themselves out of whole down two goals in the first period.

After the first few games of the season the Bruins are performing as they should beating teams they should beat in Dallas and Arizona but faced a tough task in Vegas last night. During the first couple games the Bruins offense looked stagnant and their top line was failing to produce like it had last year, on top of that their first power play unit was suffering too. When they got behind early to a solid Knights team it looked like they would be fighting an uphill battle. However their top line came alive and quickly got the Bruins back in the game. A great forecheck by Bergeron lead to a quick goal from Pastrnak and shortly after Pasta was able to find Marchand on the power play to knot the score. Early in the second the top line struck again as Pasta fed Marchand for a breakaway and Marchy quickly put it away. After that the defense chipped in with another as Krug scored his first of the year on a ripper from the point.

If the Bruins top line continues to click they’ll be as great as they were last year and will be hoping to get back to the Stanley Cup Final. Their second and third lines have been productive as well although it hasn’t appeared much on the scoresheet yet. Heinen and Coyle are playing like monsters, they’re dominating the pace of play while they’re on the ice and have made their third line more impactful than it’s been in the past three years. With Krejci returning from injury the second line is starting to get into form. The fourth line has continued to add pressure in the offensive zone and hold their own in the d-zone, which is about all you can ask from them.

On the back end the pairings have been productive and the top line has been able to shut down most teams early on and have been solid breaking the puck out of their own end. Krug and Carlo have kept their chemistry since last season and this year Carlo has been pushing the offensive play more than years’ past. He’s been using his strong skating ability to get in on the offense much like Krug does. Clifton has been all over the place and the guy hustles his ass off to get into position and make sure he never gets beat. Gryzelcyk has been as advertised and continued to play well alongside Clifton, he sat out part of last night’s game after blocking a shot but returned to the game later on.

In net the duo of Rask and Halak has been great. Both goalies have wins on the season and have made spectacular saves along the way. Rask looked strong in both of his starts so far but last night he appeared to have been dehydrated and was helped off the ice late in the third period. The Bruins are not worried and it seems he will be fine for the weekend. Halak made his start agains the Coyotes and made some dazzling saves along the way, he certainly helped steal a win for the Bruins and earned his first shutout of the season.

The Bruins will look to continue their perfect season against the tough Avalanche on Thursday night.  This will be the last game of the road trip as they return for their home opener Saturday night in Boston.

-Tyler Smith (@TylerSmith4386)