Oh man. This column is usually about me being negative over the stupidest things, but since Saturday I haven’t really had that opportunity. What is this feeling that is flowing through my like cheese whiz on a bed of steak? What is going on here? What is this upward contortion my mouth has been prone to over the past five days or so? A smile? What the fuck is a smile? Okay, I’m about to blow your minds:
The Bruins have been playing good hockey lately.
So the Bruins are up 3-0 in the Eastern Conference Semi-Finals against the Flyers. Since that win I’ve heard two things from Bruins fans:
- Bring on the Lightning because it’s sweep city
- The Bruins are going to collapse again
Um, how about neither of these things happen? For fans to go from one extreme to the other is a little ridiculous don’t you think? It’s like being on a cruise and hitting a rough patch of water and having half the boat scream “Everything is okay people!” and the other half of the boat screaming “GET ON THE LIFE JACKETS!”. My advice to Bruins fans is the same I would say to the team, take it game by game. If the Bruins lose Game 4 on Friday it’s not the end of the world and it doesn’t signify another Philadelphia “down 3-0 historic comeback”.
The Bruins are firing on all cylinders in this series against Phialdelphia. They’ve beaten the Flyers in every facet of the game, outside the terrible power play, but good news on that front later. They’ve outscored the Flyers (obviously, they’re up 3-0), they’ve out hit the Flyers, they’ve played much better defense than the Flyers and Tim Thomas has been much, much better than the Boubobeighton monster in net for Philadelphia. It was even more evident how good the Bruins were against the Flyers last night when Brad Marchand was skating around and hitting players who were much bigger than him (insert Marchand is small joke nnnnnnnnow). Everything seems to be flowing like it should and that’s good for this team.
Johnny Boychuk eats Philadelphia souls for breakfast…
I’m not even going to mention last year. No point. This is a totally different Bruins team than the club that skated out there for Games 4, 5, 6 and 7 against Philadelphia. David Krejci is healthy and is once again tearing up Philadelphia. The guy has 4 goals, 8 points and is a +6 in three games in this series. That’s out of this world good and the thing is that no one is talking about him. People (and by people, I mean Versus) is to busy ball washing James van Riemsdyk to realize how he’s been a virtual non-factor in Games 1 and 3 and Krejci has been a constant captain of Team Kickassery.
It’s not just Krejci lighting up the Flyers. Everyone who wears a Bruins jersey is. Last night Zdeno Chara had 2 goals, an assist and was a +4 while logging an insane amount of ice time (as usual). I’ll mention Chara in my random thoughts, but people will continue to kill the guy for some reason. He’s a stud and he showed why last night. Julien’s best move was pairing Chara and Seidenberg together. Again, it’ll be part of my random thoughts.
The Bruins owned the ice last night, especially at the face-off dot. Patrice Bergeron was 17/19 (89%), David Krejci was 8/8 (100%), Greg Campbell was 11/12 (92%) and Chris Kelly was 3/6 (50%) at the face-off dot. When you win the face-offs, you control possession of the puck. It’s a huge accomplishment.
Boston was just straight nasty the past three games and I hope they continue their mean streak tomorrow and end this series.
– Random Thought –
– People in this town continually bash Chara. They believe he doesn’t deserve the C, they believe he’s overrated, they believe he’s overpaid. Last night Zdeno Chara was probably the best Bruin on the ice. He had 2 goals, 1 assist, was a +4 and logged about 28 minutes of ice time. Oh and his second goal broke a painful 0-30 goalless streak on the power play. It’s not the things we see that makes Chara so good though, it’s the things we don’t see. Look at what happens when you pair someone with him, that defenseman gets better. Last year everyone was pining over Johnny Boychuk in the playoffs and who was he paired with? Chara. This year Dennis Seidenberg is playing above and beyond expectations. Who is he paired with? Chara. In the regular season, Steve Kampfer had a great stretch and who was he paired with? Chara. This isn’t a coincidence. Zdeno Chara is good enough that he allows the other defenseman to play a little loose and “roam” around the ice. Chara’s a fucking beast Boston and we should lucky to have him anchoring that defense.
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