These Boston Bruins have actually not been accustomed to losing streaks.
They tore through the N.H.L. throughout the routine season, winning 65 video games, a single-season record; declaring the Presidents’ Prize with a league-high of 135 points, 22 points clear of every other group; and outscoring their challengers by 128 objectives.
However after all that winning, a three-game losing streak, simply their second of the season, came at an unfavorable time. The Florida Panthers beat the Bruins, 4-3, in overtime of Video game 7 of their first-round playoff series on Sunday night in Boston to finish an uncommon resurgence from a 3-1 series deficit. And they did so versus a few of the most powerful opposition in the league’s 106-year history: The Bruins had 43 more points than the Panthers carried out in the routine season.
Boston had actually been so dominant that on Saturday night, after Toronto beat Tampa Bay to win a postseason series for the very first time given that 2004, some fans of the Maple Leafs collected outside the group’s arena and shouted, “We desire Florida.”
They got their desire.
Carter Verhaeghe, a member of Tampa Bay’s 2020 champion group, clinched the series with a left-handed shot from the best face-off dot through a screen by Matthew Tkachuk.
The Panthers constructed a 2-0 lead early in the 2nd duration, prompting a smattering of boos from an anxious Boston crowd. The Bruins scored 3 successive objectives and looked poised to advance, however defenseman Brandon Montour required overtime by scoring his 2nd objective of the video game with less than a minute left, and the goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky was sent out to the bench for an additional enemy.
By losing in the preliminary, the Bruins were dealt the very same fate of the 2018-19 Lightning, who had actually shared the previous record for single-season wins with the 1995-96 Detroit Red Wings. That Tampa Bay group crashed out in a four-game sweep to Columbus, motivating an apology to the fans on social networks. Of the 4 groups to win a minimum of 60 video games in a season, just one, the star-laden 1976-77 Montreal Canadiens, went on to win the Stanley Cup.
This year’s Bruins, under their first-year coach, Jim Montgomery, likewise had skill throughout their lineup. 5 gamers had at least 20 objectives, and 5 had at least 40 helps. David Pastrnak, the star winger who signed an eight-year agreement extension last month, led both those classifications with profession highs of 61 objectives and 52 helps.
In web, Linus Ullmark’s league-leading save portion and goals-against average had actually placed him as a preferred to win the Vezina Prize. And when Ullmark was not in between the pipelines, Jeremy Swayman was publishing excellent numbers, too.
This year, Boston ended up being the fastest group ever to reach 50 wins By the end, however, fans at the TD Garden were treking towards the exits after the Bruins ended up being the 28th N.H.L. group to lose a playoff series after leading by 3-1.
Boston will now go into an off-season with crucial concerns to respond to. The group does not have much income cap area, and its unlimited totally free representatives consist of 2 members of its latest champion group– Patrice Bergeron, the 37-year-old captain and a leading defensive forward; and David Krejci, who had an objective and 2 helps on Sunday. The group had actually rallied around those veterans to attempt to provide them another title.
The Bruins likewise do not have high-end draft selects offered. They do not have a very first- or second-round choice this year and, due to the fact that of a previous trade, they might not have a choice in the 2024 draft up until the 4th round.
The Panthers had actually been comfortably beaten in Video game 4 and were one overtime objective far from their season being over in the next video game. Rather, unbelievably, they’ll use.