Jim Montgomery identifies area where Bruins have shown 'biggest growth'

If you were just a casual fan tuning in for the third period of Thursday's Bruins-Hurricanes game before going to bed, it might have helped put you to sleep. And that's a great sign for Boston.

The Bruins led Carolina 3-1 after two. A boring, uneventful third period was exactly what they needed, especially since too many of these games earlier in the season turned into nail-biters and blown leads and overtime or shootout losses.

Thursday night was a professional closeout. The Bruins suffocated the Hurricanes in the defensive zone and continued to sustain some attacking time in the offensive zone. They actually outshot Carolina, 10-8, in the third. And then when the Hurricanes pulled the goalie for an extra attacker, Hampus Lindholm won a race to a loose puck and fired it about 150 feet down ice into the empty net. 4-1, game over.

It's an area where Bruins coach Jim Montgomery has seen major growth from his team, especially on their six-game road trip that they just wrapped up with a 4-2-0 record.

"I think the biggest growth we've seen is how confident we are in third periods now," Montgomery told NESN after the game. "It's nice to see in a 0-0 game [Tuesday in Nashville], we go out and win a game 3-0, and did it looking like a confident team. And now, we're up 3-1 on another elite team and we push the lead to 4-1. I don't think we gave up that much. I thought our D corps was excellent. I thought they played a great game tonight. And I thought our forwards did their job."

The road trip didn't exactly start on the most encouraging note when it came to third-period play. Back on March 23, the Bruins twice came back to tie the Flyers, but twice gave them the lead right back and ultimately lost 3-2.

That third period, combined with a slow start to practice two days later, is what led Montgomery to cuss out his team and line them up for wind sprints. Since then, the Bruins have looked much more dialed in late in games.

In Florida, they trailed the Panthers 3-2 in the third, but came back to tie the game, then took the lead, and then held on to the lead to win 4-3. The next night in Tampa, they appeared to just run out of gas while trying to come back against the Lightning. They couldn't beat the Capitals in regulation on Saturday, but did lock in for a four-minute penalty kill in overtime and then won in a shootout.

This week has been the most encouraging showing, though. As Montgomery referenced, Tuesday in Nashville they entered the third period tied 0-0 against one of the hottest teams in the league. They finally broke through to take the lead with 6:42 remaining, and then added two more goals to slam the door on any potential comeback bid from the Predators. And then came Thursday, and another strong third-period closeout against another top team.

Third periods were an area where the Bruins absolutely needed to get better, and to their credit, they have. You might have hoped they would have turned the corner earlier in the season, and you might still not be totally sold on them now being a good third-period team, which is fair.

But, perhaps most importantly, the Bruins are at least showing themselves that they can do this. They don't have to go into the playoffs thinking, "Oh boy, here we go again," the first time they have to protect a one- or two-goal lead. They now have examples they can look at that show how they can and need to play in these situations.