7. Boston Bruins at Buffalo Sabres. Squash Match.

In pro wrestling, a squash match is when an established star gets paired against a career loser for the sole purpose of crushing them and building their credibility. Today, the Bruins are Shawn Michaels. Buffalo, sweet Buffalo. Today, and every other day on the NHL schedule, you’re the Brooklyn Brawler.

Listen, the Bruins need this game like Jaromir Jagr needs to feast on the souls of 18 year old girls to stay alive. You can keep saying “It’s only been 4 games,” blow your load after a shootout win over a Datsyuk-less Detroit, and then “It’s only been 6 games!” but sooner or later, preferably sooner, this team needs to not only string some wins together, but actually look impressive doing it. They showed signs of life during the Montreal game but they went up in smoke faster than a bushel of blunts at Snoop Dogg’s house.

I’m not gonna spend too much time harping on the negative aspects of this team, because quite frankly I’m tired of being called a Canadiens fan just for criticizing the Bruins.

Instead, I’d like to focus on all the good things about these Bruins.

I’m kidding, I’m kidding.

Carl and Loui are showing the world why Swedish people are pretty much the best people on the planet. Everyone from that country is a supermodel with an engineering degree that can also play responsible two-way hockey. Except Johan Franzen, he was technically born in Lithuania and got hit with the ugly stick so hard he landed in Sweden.

Anyways, despite getting the least favorable zone starts among regular Bruins forwards, the “third” line, specifically Loui Eriksson, has had some of the strongest numbers on the team. His 5-on-5 Corsi rating (60.94%) is just a French cunt hair shy of Patrice Bergeron’s (61.07%) while actually having better defensive numbers than Mr. Perfect.

Carl is just Carl. His play has been everything that you could want out of a Big Bad Bruin, without crossing the town into Idiotville. He’s been a physical force, while only taking one minor penalty so far. Oh, and he’s the team’s leading scorer.

As far as Buffalo goes, these aren’t the Sabres we’re used to. John Scott is gone. Patrick Kaleta is too busy fucking goats, as usual, to play. Buffalo made a conscious decision in the offseason to stop trying to out-Bruin the Bruins and go back to the style that actually worked against them prior to Milan Lucic’s destruction of Ryan Miller’s career. This is a faster, smaller Sabres team. You know, the kind of team that gives Boston fits.

Make no mistake though, they’re still terrible. When your own coach publicly calls you a pee-wee team, it’s pretty clear that the only Cup you’re competing for is the one that will soon be encasing Connor McDavid’s genitals. This should be a smash job for the Bruins, and exactly the type of game they need to get back on track.

Projected Lines

Brad Marchand – Patrice Bergeron – Reilly Smith
Milan Lucic – David Krejci – Gagne West
Chris Kelly – Carl Soderberg – Loui Eriksson
Daniel Paille – Peg Leg Greg – Matt Fraser

Zdeno Chara – Dougie Hamilton
Dennis Seidenberg – Adam McQuaid
Torey Krug – Kevan Miller

Niklas Svedberg

Media

Puck Drop: 7:00pm EST
TV: NESN
Radio: 98.5 The Sports Hub

STREAMS: HERE

Know The Enemy

Gameday Video/Image.

We need more Swedes on the team.