The Two-Line Pass

The Lead

The Sharks are an astonishingly good team, the Red Wings are very good as well. The Blackhawks have a great deal going for them. And all of them pale in comparison with the Boston Bruins, who just two seasons ago finished 23rd in the league.

Tonight, Boston, playing its third road game in four days, dismantled Pittsburgh on the way to a 5-2 victory that came with surgical precision. Every mistake the Penguins made was paid for in blood.

Boston’s first goal came on a second-period power play when the Bruins overloaded the right side of the ice and, after PJ Axelsson mishandled a pass, he faked toward the corner and with the help of a forward down low, drew both Pittsburgh defenders below the faceoff circle and to the left of Marc-Andre Fleury. What every Penguin on the ice missed was Zdeno Chara sneaking onto the backdoor like a shifty forward half his size, that is until he shoveled home a seeing-eye pass from Axelsson to pull the Bruins even. Marc Savard sniped another power play goal a few minutes later to put the Bruins up 2-1.

Soon after, Pascal Dupuis put a slapshot into Mach 5 to beat Tim Thomas high to the glove side and tie the game again, but like using conventional weapons on Godzilla, it only made the Bruins angry. Phil Kessel scored on a tap-in 1:30 later and Martin St. Pierre and Dennis Wideman added third-period insurance goals to ice the game. And it all looked so incredibly easy. Tonight, they SILENCED Sid Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. The former had an assist on the Dupuis goal that was an individual effort, the latter had dick, and they combined for a nice minus-3 rating.

They now have the same number of points (60) as league-leading San Jose, which only leads the league on the formality of its one game in hand, but it’s not too far into the hazy past where San Jose looked all but uncatchable. The reason, of course, is that Boston is now undoubtedly the best team in hockey. In November and December, they lost an incredible TWO games in regulation, and this is a team that got off to a 2-2-3 start. In its last 30 games, Boston is 26-3-1, a winning percentage of .883(!).

The Bruins have scored the most goals (137, five ahead of Detroit and 11 ahead of San Jose), the and allowed the fewest (82, two ahead of San Jose and six ahead of Chicago, both of which have played fewer games).

They have the best goaltending tandem in hockey — Tim Thomas has a line of 2.04/.935 in 22 games and Manny Fernandez has a 2.02/.930 in 16.

They’re arguably as deep at forward as Detroit or San Jose and while they don’t have the singular star power provided by your Crolkins and Semvechkins and Datsutterbergs, you have to feel like the contributions of Marc Savard (12-34-46), David Krejci (13-27-40) and Phil Kessel (23-16-39) are pretty outstanding from any point of view from which you choose to view them. Blake Wheeler and Milan Lucic are playing pretty well too. And that’s not even counting the man-games they’ve lost to injury. Patrice Bergeron’s a guy any GM in the league would take in a heartbeat, and he’s missed the last few games of this nifty little nine-game winning streak the Bruins are on. Chuck Kobasew’s missed 12 games, Marco Sturm’s missed 19, and they’re both worth about .65 points a game. Not that the Bruins need it.

And the Bruins blue line is stacked as well. Zdeno Chara’s reputation speaks for itself. The guy was a Norris finalist last year, he eats big minutes and he’s a phenomenal leader on and off the ice. Dennis Wideman is the most underrated No. 2 defenseman in the National Hockey League, and he has more points than Chara. Aaron Ward has played well when he’s been healthy, Mark Stuart’s developing into a very nice stay-at-home defenseman in his own right, and the rotating collection of youngsters filling in for whichever defenseman is injured on a given night has never looked entirely out of place.

The Bruins have won nine in a row, and all but three of those have been at home. Six of those have been on back-to-back nights. They’ve lost five games in regulation all year. All despite a rash of injuries to several important players. And let’s hear the arguments that someone’s better.

The Bruins played Detroit already and beat them 4-1. No problem. They played Chicago too, controlled the entire game and won in a shootout, 2-1. The result was slightly better than Chicago deserved. They won’t play San Jose until Tuesday Feb. 10 in Boston, but with the way the Sharks are playing lately, they might not even be in this discussion by the time Big Joe Thornton and Co. rumble back into town.

In the calendar year of 2008, the Bruins went 50-18-12 in the regular season, winning 112 points from 80 games. What Claude Julien has done on Causeway St. is truly amazing.

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The Lead

At the risk of angering both people who bother to read Good Night on a nightly basis, I have a confession. I only watched the Bruins game tonight because I went to an art show — I start my internship at Vogue next summer haw haw! — and at some point I have to just wash my hands of every, “Boy these Bruins sure are a top-notch team,” post I am backed into making.. at least for a while.

Yeah, they’re a hell of a goddamn hockey club and even when they suck they score eight goals and win anyways. David Krejci had a hat trick and I think he’s like the fifth Bruin to have one this year (I know for sure Kessel, Lucic and Wheeler had one each but I feel like I’m forgetting someone and don’t care to look it up). Not that the game wasn’t fun to watch and featured 13 goals and a couple fights, but there’s just no other way to say, “They’ll beat you any way they want!” that no one else has said. At some point you have to stop looking at your computer screen and going “I have to write like 600 words on these guys winning AGAIN,” and tell yourself no.

Watching a good team gets pretty damn boring sometimes. That picture’s pretty funny though, right?

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The Lead

Start from the bottom up as far as, say, the top 20 goalscorers in the National Hockey League at this point in the season.

Slava Kozlov at 20 with 12 goals. A bunch of other guys are tied with him, like Jarome Iginla, Shane Doan, Patrick Marleau and Patrick Kane. With 13 each you have Alex Semin, Devin Setoguchi, Sid Crosby, Dany Heatley, Simon Gagne and Rick Nash. Teemu Selanne, Patrick Sharp, Zach Parise, Marian Hossa and Alex Ovechkin are all next with 14 apiece. And above all of them, just behind Jeff Carter and Tom Vanek’s 18 goals, is Phil Kessel, who has 15.

The kid had 19 in 82 games last year, and through 25, he’s already got 15 and he’s a huge reason the Bruins are tied for the lead in the Eastern Conference with four games in hand on the New York Rangers. Hell, he was a big reason the Bruins even won tonight.

The Bruins hadn’t played since last Saturday after playing its busiest stretch of the season, 10 games in 17 days, and tonight they sure looked it. They were sluggish and inattentive in the first period, where they were outchanced by Tampa about 8-2 or so. Tampa (TAMPA!) looked almost dominant in the flow of play. Marty St. Louis’ goal was a prettyish little two-on-two play, but if Mark Stuart had paid the slightest bit of attention to his man instead of Vinny Lecavalier, who had the puck, he wouldn’t have looked quite so stupid in flailing to block the ensuing pass or shot, both of which he was hopelessly out of position for. But because Tampa’s Tampa and the Bruins are the best team in the East, they only managed one goal despite the huge advantage in play. Fortunately for Boston, Tim Thomas, who made 30 saves, allowed just one goal and once strangled a grizzly with his bare hands, settled down after that.

In the second, the Bruins tried to inject a little artificial life into their game. Zdeno Chara got into a bit of an exchange down by Tim Thomas and that seemed to really fire up the bench. Within a few shifts, the Bruins were starting to compose their attack, and once Kessel’s line, that also features Milan Lucic and Marc Savard, hopped over the boards, you knew they’d be leveling the score soon enough. Kessel lifted a stick in the neutral zone, stole the puck and broke the other way on a rush, only to crush a slapshot off the far post from 50 feet out, and the pressure from Boston kept building. Kessel finally tied the game on his next shift at 12:21, converting a sexy no-look pass from the endboards and into the slot from Savard.

The score remained tied until excellent rookie Blake Wheeler blocked a pass attempt on a Tampa power play and sprung David Krejci for a gorgeous shorthanded 1-on-2 goal. His toe-drag around Paul Ranger was beautiful and the speed of his release to get the puck away just before Andrej Mezsaros got a stick in there was unbelievable. That’s a goal you’ll be seeing in a couple highlight videos, I suspect.

Kessel also added an empty netter with 0.5 seconds remaining to bump his goal total to 15, THIRD in the NHL. If you had taken a DeLorean back one year ago and said to anyone who watches the Bruins a lot that Phil Kessel would be lifting sticks, blocking shots and shooting the puck more than anyone on the team, they would’ve had you locked up. The transformation this kid has undergone is ridiculous.

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So Boston.com has named Aaron Ward one of the 25 most stylish Bostonians of 2008, which, while well-earned (Wardo is indeed a very fashionable gentleman; the first time I ever met him he was wearing an immaculate charcoal suit and his grandfather’s fur coat), is a little odd.

When reading the occupations of the other people on the list — jewelry designer, anchorwoman for Channel 7, PR coordinator for Saks Fifth Avenue, chairwoman of the fashion council at the Museum of Fine Arts, musician, artists/jewelry makers, director of sales for Montage furniture, co-owners of various “nerd bars” in the city, interior design business consultant, musician (again), musician (once more), curators of an art gallery, general manager of a hip restaurant in the Back Bay, editor-in-chief of a women’s fashion website, manager at a hipster restaurant, co-owners of an urban style shop, the dean of Harvard’s Graduate School of Design, VP of business development for an architecture firm, founder of a comm company, owner of a women’s clothing shop, an architecture professor at MIT, an Olympic swimmer/anesthesiologist, electrical engineer/fashion blogger, and consultant for international businesses and nonprofits — you don’t really expect to see “rugged NHL defenseman” alongside them.

Last year, though, Celtics guard Ray Allen and Pats defensive back Ellis Hobbs were named to the list despite the fact that the latter just rips off Kanye West’s style and Tom Brady dresses far better than both of them anyway.

One highlight, in which Ward almost comes across as Patrick Bateman from the book version of American Psycho:

So what are you wearing in this picture? It’s a gray suit by Zegna, shoes from Barneys New York, a shirt by Faconnable, a Burberry belt, and the tie’s Armani.

He works with a tailor out of New York because he doesn’t fit into off-the-rack suits, and the tailor also makes golf shorts for Marc Savard (who can’t fit into normal golf shorts?). He also lists his main fashion influences as the show “Boston Legal” (for real) and his father, who would go to Ward’s youth hockey games in a tie and sweater vest. Classy.

Ward’s one piece of fashion advice for you hockey blog-reading cretins in your Hartford Whaler sweatshirts with Cheeto dust on the front: “You can’t go wrong with a Ted Baker tie.”

The difference between why people will call Sean Avery gay for being into fashion but not Aaron Ward, by the way, is that Aaron Ward will literally beat you to death.

The Lead

Even when they spot their opponent four goals on the first nine shots, the Boston Bruins are unbeatable in November. In the eight games they’ve played in 19 days, which by the way is their busiest stretch of the year, they are 7-0-1 and have outscored opponents 34 to 14. The only loss, that in a shootout, was to the New York Rangers in a game the B’s led 2-0 with just under six minutes to go.

But consider this: their wild 7-4 win over the Sabres tonight was the first time all month they allowed more than two goals. It was also just about the wackiest goddamn game I’ve seen this season. The Sabres scored 1:41 in. The Bruins scored 1:18 later. Then the Sabres scored again 1:30 after that. Just 29 seconds later, they scored again. Boston answered 30 seconds later at 5:38. At 12:37 Buffalo made it 4-2, but Boston pulled back within one 31 seconds after that. The Sabres had to clear another puck off the line soon after that to hold onto the lead.

Bonkers.

But the Bruins grabbed the game by the scruff of its neck in the second period, outshooting Buffalo 12-8 and outscoring them 3-0. This was thanks in large part to Buffalo’s continual parade to the penalty box, which allowed Zdeno Chara to score a couple of booming power play goals wrapped around an even-strength goal from Chuck Kobasew to put the Bruins even, up, and then out of reach. Phil Kessel’s goal early in the third was all Lindy Ruff could stand from Ryan Miller, who left the game having surrendered seven goals on 20 shots (just slightly better than Pascal Leclaire’s gong show performance last night).

And while Manny Fernandez obviously fought the puck a little bit early on, he was solid after the first, though he was only asked to make 15 saves. It was, though, a game as choppy and without flow as a scoreline like that would indicate. Neither team could establish anything through the neutral zone and nor were they especially interested in maintaining offensive zone possession should they actually be lucky enough to gain it.

Chara had two goals, Kobasew had two goals, Tom Vanek had two goals, Dave Krejci scored and added two helpers and Marc Savard quietly had a goal and three assists to boost his total to 7-18-25 in 19 games, which is third-best in the league and Savard is still somehow undiscussed on the national stage.

But what this showed, to me at least, is that the Bruins’ early success is by no means a fluke. They’ve won just about every way you can this month. Big wins against Dallas, Toronto and Montreal in which they won 16-4 on aggregate show they can dominate. The wins of 3-1 over Buffalo and 2-1 over Chicago in a shootout show they can grind it out with highly-skilled teams if need be and still come out victorious. This win tonight shows that they can battle and overcome adversity, even despite shaky play from the backup netminder. The only nagging thing is that one game they blew against the Rangers. But if they can go the rest of the month without dropping a game — and with remaining opponents of Florida, a struggling Montreal, Buffalo again, the Islanders and Red Wings, it’s not entirely impossible — they won’t really be kicking themselves over one loss to the Rangers, to whom they are second in the conference by two points but benefit from three games in hand.

I didn’t really think it was possible, but as of right now, the Bruins are the best team in the East, and thus the one by which all others will be measured. It seems unlikely that anyone can match the varied skillset brought by the Bruins’ group of forwards (maybe Montreal, but they ain’t exactly going 2 for 6 on the powerplay these days). The D corps is clearly untouchable in the conference otherwise bereft of an imposing blue line that’s that deep at Nos. 1 to 6. And the goaltending, between Tim Thomas’ all-out awesomeness and Fernandez’s more-than-capable backup work despite tonight’s iffy performance, is unrivaled, perhaps in whole the league.

No one besides the Sharks are playing on the same level as the Bruins right now, and frankly I don’t think anyone in the East is even capable of it.

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The Lead

(Oh yeah, like I wasn’t writing about this one.)

That much-heralded Dion Phaneuf/Milan Lucic tilt didn’t happen (boooooo, Ference and Iginla), but that was not enough to prevent the Flames and Bruins from playing a pretty decent hockey game tonight in Calgary.

Phaneuf scored and added a helper and Lucic picked up one assist, but the Flames emerged 3-2 victors and spoiled Boston’s perfect road trip. For the Flames, it was their fifth win in a row.

For the Bruins, it was the first time they allowed more than zero goals (really) on their three-game swing through Western Canada. And really, all it took was one bad period to doom the Black and Gold. Boston gave up four power plays in the second and Calgary capitalized on two of them to first level at one and then take a lead. Phaneuf’s goal came first when he followed a Jarome Iginla shot and tipped it over a diving Tim Thomas. The second came when Mike Cammalleri tipped a patented Dion Phaneuf rocket from the point. That was all Calgary needed, essentially. Dustin Boyd’s early third-period goal was very nice and proved the eventual game-winner, but once Calgary went up, the Saddledome was alive and the Bruins didn’t stand a chance.

That is not, however, necessarily their fault. Tim Thomas had an extraordinarily busy four-day trip, stopping 58 shots in Edmonton and Vancouver on back-to-back nights and getting the shutout both times, and then facing a 38-shot onslaught tonight. Something had to give, and the goals that Calgary scored were on a rebound, a redirection and another rebound. Two were on the power play. None were exactly his fault. Plus you have to question the fairness of the NHL supercomputers that schedule the B’s for a game in Edmonton Monday, Vancouver Tuesday then head back to Calgary Thursday. Why not two Alberta games back-to-back? So much for the NHL going green, eh?

The Bruins have to leave Calgary happy with the results of the road trip overall, but disappointed in the offense. Only four goals in nine-plus periods is not the best output in the world, even if you allow only three over that same stretch. But Boston will also return to the east coast with its No. 1 starter firmly established. Thomas made the point clearly and emphatically that Manny Fernandez, for all the cash the Bruins are dumping into his lost-cause contract, deserves to be on doorman duty until such time as Thomas asks for a night off. You only give up three goals on 96 shots during a road trip and keep the Bruins in a game in Calgary where they were outshot 20-8 in the second period, you earned that No. 1 spot. Let Fernandez get his requisite 15 starts the rest of the way and nothing more, because this is and, despite the Bruins’ silly insistence to the contrary, always was Tim Thomas’ job.

Across the rink from Thomas, Miikka Kiprusoff continued his hot streak, surrendering two goals on 31 shots and generally looking impressive. The only goal of the first period came when Kiprusoff made a mess of a handled puck behind the net and Patrice Bergeron picked his pocket for an ugly wraparound. Blake Wheeler’s goal midway through the third was an awful pretty shot following a cross-ice pass and and was also awful unstoppable.

(Note to Peter Chiarelli: Psst, I heard the Blues, Kings, Thrashers and Islanders might need goaltending help. Just sayin’.)

P.S. For those keeping score at home, this is Calgary’s second win in which Jarome Iginla goes without a goal.

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In the wake of the Red Sox entirely predictable 3-1 loss to the Tampa Bay Rays in the American League Championship Series, the Boston Globe asked its readers a question:

With the Red Sox now in offseason mode, what are you most looking forward to?

The answer was astonishing.

The Bruins
	34.7%
The Celtics
	31.8%
Nothing. I miss the Red Sox already!
	19.3%
The Patriots
	9.3%
College sports
	3.6%
The Revolution
	1.0%
High school sports
	0.3%

The Bruins? Of all the things I would have guessed that the result would be, the Bruins leading the defending world champion Celtics by three percent, and taking over a third of the total votes was not among them.

Granted, the Pats would likely have the vote in a runaway if Tom Brady hadn’t had his knee demolished in Week 1, but still. This is pretty crazy, even if the Boston sports media won’t even bother to give it a second thought.

With Ryan Parent on the shelf for the next three months, Randy Jones another eight weeks from coming back, and Luca Sbisa maybe headed back to juniors soon so as not to start his free agency clock (though that’s looking less and less likely), the Flyers had to do something.

So Boston, which had two NHL-quality players wasting away in Providence, was more than happy to send over Andrew Alberts and his way-too-big $1.25 million salary. Not reported in that TSN article, but included (from what I’ve heard), is an ECHL-level winger named Ned Lukacevic. The pick is also a conditional fourth-rounder in ‘09, not a straight-up one. If Alberts, who’s in the second season of a two-year deal, re-signs in Philly, it becomes a third-round pick. Pretty sure Boston traded its fourth-round pick in 2009 in the Manny Fernandez deal.

This solves both teams’ problems, actually. Philly gets its servicable, if overpaid, defenseman and Boston gets to call up defenseman Matt Hunwick, who impressed at camp but just couldn’t crack the top 6 because of Alberts’ contract predicating that he stays up, and forward Vladimir Sobotka, also a victim of Alberts’ cap hit.

Last night Chuck Kobasew took a puck in the ankle in the second period but finished the game and even set up David Krejci’s game-winner. As with many ankle injuries in hockey, it wasn’t a problem until he removed his skate.

But according to the great Kevin Paul Dupont, he’s in a walking cast today and getting an x-ray. He may have fractured it and could miss tomorrow night’s game. He missed 11 games last year and 32 the year before.

The team is considering putting Andrew Alberts at the wing for tomorrow night’s game against Minnesota. That’s just what Boston, the team that had the third-most games lost to injury last year, needs.

As I so astutely pointed out last weekend, the Bruins had to do something to get Blake Wheeler and Vladimir Sobotka on the team. Wheeler had been too good in just about every preseason game, too omnipresent in the offensive zone even when he wasn’t scoring points, for the Bruins to send him to Providence. Sobotka had been too useful in every zone.

But the Bs were right against the salary cap with no real wiggle room to speak of. That’s why general manager Peter Chiarelli smartly decided to waive Peter Schaefer and his inexplicable $2.1 million cap hit. The time when Schaefer looked like a viable option for a team like the Bruins has long since come and gone, with the brief flashes of skill he showed in Ottawa having evaporated the second he pulled on a Bruins sweater. That being the case, when Chiarelli put feelers out for a trade partner this morning, none were forthcoming.

From the Globe:

“He’s been in the league for a while,” said Chiarelli. “I think he knew what was coming, especially with the play of Blake Wheeler. He pretty much expected it, is what he told me.”

That’s the way these things go, though. No one wanted Mathieu Schneider when he first went through waivers (not that Peter Schaefer is anywhere near the contributor Schneider is, but you see my point).

The Bruins also waived Jeremy Reich and Nate Thompson and assigned Matt Hunwick to Providence, and the line to claim either of the forwards forms to the left. There are to be no takers. With that, the Bruins are down to the 23-man roster, and Wheeler, along with Sobotka have made the team.