Eastern Conference Quarterfinals Game 5: Toronto Maple Leafs at Boston Bruins. FINISH THEM

BOSTON LEADS SERIES 3-1

krejci

Tonight the Bruins have a chance to kill the Leafs' chance of advancing to the second round for good. Tonight, Boston takes a 3-1 series lead into their own arena, with their crowd behind them (although it's debatable is the Garden crowd is even there at times) and David Krejci riding a hot streak that can only be compared to solar flares.

Boston needs to curbstomp Toronto and finish them. Heading back to Toronto for Game 6 should not be in the cards tomorrow morning. They need to come out there and they need to beat them up physically. They need to take it to Dion Phaneuf and let him do Dion Phaneuf things, like he did in Game 4.

Tonight the Bruins need to decimate the Toronto Maple Leafs and make them wish they never made the playoffs.

Sometimes I wonder how Toronto made the playoffs. I guess when you factor in that the Southeast Division is absolutely god awful and everyone outside of the Penguins in the Atlantic seemed to be like "Playoffs?! NOPE! NOPE! NOPE!" it was easy for Toronto to slide their way into 5th. James Reimer has been awful this playoff series, which has benefited Boston.

(Thanks Dan Watkins)

How Reimer is even still playing in this series is beyond me, but I guess when Bemn Scrievens is your backup goaltender, there's not much else to go on. Reimer is the ice cream sprinkles on the Toronto Maple Leafs' shit sundae, really. The guy has Dion Phaneuf turning puck over in front of him. If you want to look at the reason Toronto is down 3-1 in this series, you need to only look at one thing:

Turnovers.

(click the image [or this link] for higher res shot)

Look at that. The top four league leaders in giveaways are Toronto Maple Leafs defensemen. I felt the need to bold that statement because it's amazing that something like that even happens. They're atrocious. It's cute to watch people try and defend Phaneuf too. His stats alone, for being the Leafs "number one" defenseman, are comical.

11 Giveaways vs 0 takeaways.

If Boston continues to force Toronto the turn the puck over, the Bruins will win tonight. Bank on it. Write it down. Put it on the board. Scrape it into the wall or whatever else the children say these days.

For those who don't know already – Matt Bartkowski has been called up from Providence last night. I'm not sure what that entails, if Boychuk is really injured after taking that shot off of his leg or is someone else is hurt. We will be updating our Facebook if we hear anything.

Actually, here's an update from Fluto:

Bartkowski taking rushes with McQuaid. Would likely go in if Redden, for whatever reason, is unavailable.

— Fluto Shinzawa (@GlobeFluto) May 10, 2013

//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

So Redden isn't skating right now. Could be an injury or could be a little time off to rest his old bones – no one really knows.

krejci

Since today is possibly the last game in the playoffs for the Maple Leafs, how many James van Reimsdyves to we see tonight? Over? Under? I'll start the line at 3.

After the jump the rest of the preview…

Boston Strong Pin

Our buddy Eric, also known to many of you as BosBruinsFan on Twitter, has put together a Boston Strong pin. Here's a picture to see the actual size of the pin.

These things aren't a cheap piece of plastic. They're beautiful! $2 of every purchase goes directly to One Fund Boston, so grab a couple.

Bruins Projected Lines

Milan Lucic – David Krejci – Nathan Horton
Brad Marchand – Patrice Bergeron – Tyler Seguin
Jaromir Jagr – Chris Kelly – Rich Peverley
Shawn Thornton – Greg Campbell – Dan Paille

Zdeno Chara – Dennis Seidenberg
Andrew Ference – Johnny Boychuk
Adam McQuaid – Matt Bartkowski

Tuukka Rask
Anton Khudobin

DOY Flying Bear T-Shirt