The Bruins didn’t start the way they wanted as they looked to bounce back from Thursday’s loss to the Oilers, but they did finally wake up and mount a 3-2 comeback win over the Red Wings, becoming the fastest team to 50 wins in NHL history in the process.
Boston fell behind 2-0 in a disastrous first period, but came back to tie the game in a dominant second. In the third, the Bruins survived an early push from Detroit before taking the lead with 6:06 remaining thanks to their fourth line, which was a bright spot all day, even when the rest of the team was struggling early on.
Charlie McAvoy started the play that led to the winning goal with a perfectly weighted saucer pass to Tomas Nosek on the breakout. Nosek moved it over to A.J. Greer, who fired a shot that handcuffed an otherwise-excellent Magnus Hellberg and produced a juicy rebound for deadline acquisition Garnet Hathaway to bury for his first goal as a Bruin.
That fourth line set the tone all day, both physically and often offensively. They were heavy on the forecheck and were able to pin the Wings in their own zone throughout the game. During a first period that was lopsided in Detroit’s favor, the fourth line was the only one able to generate any offensive momentum for Boston.
For the game, the Bruins out-attempted Detroit 15-7 when the fourth line was on the ice and had eight scoring chances to three against. Nosek had seven shot attempts, Greer six and Hathaway two, including the most important one. Hathaway had a game-high five hits, while Greer was credited with two and Nosek one.
“Really deserving,” coach Jim Montgomery said of the fourth line scoring the winner. “I thought they were our best line all night long. Right from the first shift of the game, where I thought they got us going north. They had a lot of good looks and spent a lot of time in the O-zone, despite the fact that I start them in the D-zone a lot of times.”
That fourth line is getting plenty of ice time now, but what it will look like and how much ice time these three guys will get in the playoffs remains a question. ESPN’s Emily Kaplan reported during Saturday’s broadcast that the second opinion on Taylor Hall’s lower-body injury came back much more positive than the initial prognosis, and that Nick Foligno is expected to return from his lower-body injury either at the very end of the regular season or early in the first round of the playoffs.
Simple math tells you their eventual return means two forwards will have to come out of the lineup if everyone’s healthy at the time. The fourth line is naturally where you would look. But all that remains a ways off, and Greer, Nosek and Hathaway certainly made a strong case for themselves on Saturday.
“I think we played to the identity that we want to,” Hathaway said after the game. “I thought Nosey’s been great in the dot for a lot of games now. I thought he was great tonight, too. Greersy gets on every puck and forechecks really well. We started making plays, and then I can feed off that. Our game is moving through the zones, trying to get in the O-zone, and I thought we were able to wear them down a little bit tonight. Getting the goal for the line was just kind of the cherry on top for us.”
Aside from the fourth line’s shifts, the first 10-plus minutes of Saturday’s game were about as bad a stretch as the Bruins have played all season, which is obviously not how they wanted to respond after blowing a third-period lead and losing to Edmonton on Thursday.
The Bruins actually drew a power play just 1:10 into the game, but it wound up being a disaster and swung momentum in Detroit’s favor instead. Just 26 seconds into it, David Krejci turned the puck over on an entry attempt, sending Andrew Copp the other way for a shorthanded goal.
The Red Wings nearly scored a second shorthanded goal a minute later when Dmitry Orlov turned the puck over just inside the offensive zone, eventually leading to a Pius Suter shorthanded breakaway. Linus Ullmark stopped that with a great pad save, but the Bruins weren’t out of the woods yet.
Just as the power play was ending, Krejci turned the puck over again and then took a hooking penalty. Detroit’s special teams struck again, with a tic-tac-toe passing play from Dylan Larkin to David Perron to Alex Chiasson resulting in an easy tap-in.
The Bruins continued to get outplayed for much of the first period, trailing in shots 13-5 at one point before finally putting together a little bit of a push towards the end of the period.
They played much better hockey to start the second. In fact, if the first period showcased some of the Bruins’ worst hockey of the season, the second featured them at just about their most dominant. Through the first seven minutes of the period, the Bruins led in shots on goal 12-0 and shot attempts 22-0.
Yet they still trailed 2-0, with Hellberg standing on his head. That finally changed with 7:17 left in the second when Hampus Lindholm wristed a shot through traffic from the point that beat Hellberg off the post and in.
The Bruins tied the game 1:28 later, finally breaking through on the power play when Jake DeBrusk fed Patrice Bergeron in front for a nice redirect goal. It was just the third goal for the Bruins’ top power-play unit in the last 17 games, and the first since Dmitry Orlov got moved to the top unit on Thursday. Orlov picked up the secondary assist on the goal for his 10th point in seven games with Boston.
When the second period was all said and done, the Bruins had outshot the Red Wings 18-2 and out-attempted them 36-5. It was exactly the kind of turnaround Boston needed before heading out on a five-game road trip.
“I thought we were more physical without the puck, and I thought we were more committed to hard offensive hockey,” Montgomery said of the in-game turnaround. “If we didn’t have any space, we were willing to put it in and go forecheck and/or possess it down low, and then move our feet.”
With the win, the Bruins improved to 50-9-5 on the season. Getting to 50 wins in 64 games is two games faster than any team in history, a record that was previously held by the 1995-96 Red Wings and 2018-19 Tampa Bay Lightning.
The Bruins could clinch a playoff spot later Saturday if the Islanders lose to the Capitals in any fashion, or if the Senators lose to the Canucks in regulation.
(UPDATE: The Bruins did officially clinch a playoff spot with the Islanders' loss to the Capitals Saturday night. At 64 games, they are the third-fastest team ever to do so. Only the 1995-96 Red Wings (59) and 1998-99 Stars (63) have done it faster.)
The Bruins and Wings turn right around and play each other again Sunday afternoon in Detroit at 1:30 p.m.
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