(Purrgeron note: Sorry if this recap sucks. Jon did it on three hours of sleep. I'll poop in his Lucky Charms as pay back)
One down, three to go.
Five minutes into the first period the Penguins were all over the Bruins. They were out hitting them, out playing them and the only reason the Bruins weren't down a couple goals or so early was Tuukka Rask. Then you saw Julien yelling at them on the bench. Most of his little speech probably can't be repeated on cable TV. It was pretty much all over after that. Mostly thanks to Rask.
The Penguins completely broke down. They lost any semblance of composure. The Bruins were frustrating Pittsburgh and the Penguins cracked. They spent more time trying to get in the Bruins heads than they did scoring. When the Bruins did give PIttsburgh good chances, Rask shut the door. And the Bruins loved it. That seemed to be the game plan. The Bruins obviously watched some tape from the Penguins-Flyers series last year. The Penguins apparently learned nothing.
Pittsburgh tried everything. They even had Crosby skate over and push Rask. The infamously ill tempered Tuuuuuuuukka just shrugged his shoulders and told Crosby he was too busy making awesome saves to care.
Will they hold Pittsburgh offense scoreless again? Probably not. Bruins still need to be better. A lot better. But Rask bought property in Pittsburgh's head.
Especially Crosby's. If biggest doesn't regain their composure in Game Two this could be a MUCH shorter series than anyone though. We can't count on that though. Chances are Pittsburgh comes out hungry for Game Two. Bruins better hope Rask's back is strong.
And if Rask keeps playing like this… well, let's not get ahead of ourselves.
– David Krejci. Really, how incredible has he been? Playoff HERO. HERO. Two more goals tonight and came close to the hatty a few times.
– Pittsburgh for leaving Horton all alone.
– Horton's pretty shot. Pretty like Crosby's mouth. Wait no.
– Rask. No words will do his performance justice. There were at least five times where we were like shiiiiiiiiiiit Pittsburgh is going to score and then Rask was like don't worry guys I got this calm the f down. WE LOVE YOU!
– The entire Bruins team for not letting Pittsburgh get into their heads. They focused on winning which is all they should've been focusing on. They seem to understand the best way to really hurt Pittsburgh is to win the series, not a bunch of fights.
– Chara laughing right in Crosby's face.
– Leave it to Bergeron to make a bloody face look good.
– Rask
– Krejci
– Rask
– Krejci
– Davuukka Krask
– That piece of shit Matt Cooke. Not even words to describe how much he sucks. So fucking glad McQuaid is okay. Could've been a lot worse.
– And while it wasn't quite as bad, Marchand's hit on Neal was dumb, dumb, dumb too.
– Vokoun, generally taking a poop in public is frowned upon buddy.
– Crosby and Malkin. Great leadership there guys. But honestly, thanks for spending more time throwing cheap shots than scoring. We appreciate it. Do it for three more games please.
– Crosby thinking he could take on Chara. Your jaw finally healed buddy. Maybe it's a good idea to not tempt Chara to break it again.
– Bruins power play is back to being awful. 🙁
– Let's be honest… this game could've been a lot different. Bruins defense gave Pittsburgh TONS of good chances. Rask was the savior. Pittsburgh is too good to keep missing on those types of chances if the Bruins keep giving them up. We're happy with the win, but the Bruins still need to be better. Pens did hit a couple posts :-/
– Who can stop David Krejci?
– Who is Eric Cartman's father?
– How much is CBlog going to shit on us?
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