Kessel Mania on Causeway, Round 2.

I know Kessel Mania Round 1 was a tough act to follow, but although the Bruins put forth a solid effort for all of ten minutes, they were able to hang on and beat Toronto 5-2 at the TD Garden on Thursday night. The Bruins fans were loud once again, taunting Phil Kessel every time he was on the ice and booing every time he touched the puck. I honestly think the fans were in his head, along with the fear that any Bruin player was willing to put a licking on him at any time since he’s been on such a great scoring streak, but if you watched his two games in Boston, you’d think he was playing on the 4^th line with Colton Orr. I didn’t bring my “ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS A KE$$EL KNOCKOUT” sign because I didn’t feel like lugging it around with me all night knowing I wouldn’t get on the Jumbotron, and honestly, I wanted to enjoy the intermissions with my buddies and not being bugged again for pictures. It was fun the first time. I could have left my sign at the seat during intermissions but I didn’t want it being potentially stepped on or taken for that matter.

The Bruins came out and had a pretty solid first period despite failing to score on a 4 minute powerplay 16 seconds into the game, which was pretty annoying since Toronto is terrible and I wanted the Bruins to put Toronto away early. Mark Stuart got the ball rolling as Johnny Boychuk slid the puck across the blueline to Stuart, who one timed a rocket through Toronto goaltender Vesa Toskala’s legs. That was Boychuk’s first NHL assist. The Bruins went into the room after 20 minutes up 1-0. The Bruins were quick to make it a two goal lead in the first minute of the second period as Zdeno Chara slid the puck over to Derek Morris, who fired a slapper from the top of the faceoff dot and beat Toskala shortside. It was Morris’ third goal of the season and first goal as a Bruin at home. Shortly after Morris put the Bruins up by 2, Mark Stuart and Jamal Mayers picked up from where they left off on Saturday, going at it and wrestling each other to the ice pretty quickly; both players were assessed two minute minors for roughing. The two of them were yelling at each other in the penalty box for the entire two minutes and as soon as they stepped out of the penalty box, they dropped the gloves and went at it again. I would give the edge to Stuart as he landed a few good punches to Mayers’ face. The Bruins then went up 3-0 as Tuukka Rask made an unbelieveable pad save to rob Tomas Kaberle point blank; the puck then deflected back to Toronto defenseman Luke Schenn, who fired a shot which was blocked by David Krejci, who then took possession of the puck and went in all alone for a breakaway, absolutely undressing Toskala to make the score 3-0. That goal got the Garden really fired up and made the Kessel harassment that much more enjoyable. The score was 3-0 Bruins going into the third.

I don’t know what it is, but the Bruins have had a tendency for not playing the full 60 minutes in a lot of their games. Toronto got on the board 16 seconds into the third period as Mikhail Grabolski broke up the shutout for the second consecutive game against the Bruins as he was put in a rebound of a Niklas Hagman shot. Toronto put more and more pressure on the Bruins and Nikolai Kulemin redirected a pass from Mike Komisarek top shelf to make it a 3-2 game less than 5 minutes into the third. Claude Julien immediately called a timeout, but the Bruins were still very sluggish as Zdeno Chara accidently fired a shot on Tuukka Rask which thankfully Tuukka was alert and stopped the shot. I would have gone off the balcony had Chara scored on his own net to tie it at 3. Moments after the near miscue by Chara, Rask made a gamesaving stop to rob Matt Stajan, keeping it a 1 goal game as he dove across the crease to made a blocker save. That save brought the crowd to its feet, and really started to make me question if this Rask/Thomas goalending situation is turning into Fernandez/Thomas from last season where Thomas was playing great and in majority of the games when Fernandez was making $5.25M and Thomas was making a million and this season, Thomas is making $6M, meanwhile Rask is making just over a million. The Garden crowd erupted when Kessel finally got nailed; he skated into the zone with the puck, and Mark Stuart lined him up and pasted him into the boards. The Garden cheered and yours truly stood up and yelled, “THATA BOY, STU!!!!” I had noticed during the 2^nd and 3^rd periods, Kessel wasn’t skating on the first line and I think it was to get away from Zdeno Chara since Chara was shadowing him and all over him, not giving him any room to maneuver and do anything. The Bruins got a late powerplay as Jason Blake hooked Zdeno Chara, which led to Mark Recchi getting a huge insurance goal as Patrice Bergeron fired a wrist shot from the point, which David Krejci tried to score on the rebound but the lost the puck in his skates; Blake Wheeler then took possession of the puck and slid a gorgeous pass across the crease to Recchi, who shot the puck and scored on his own rebound to make it 4-2 with less than 4 minutes to go. Toronto pulled Toskala with just under two minutes to go and Mark Recchi got his second goal of the night as he hit the open net to seal the deal on a 5-2 win. It never should have gotten to that point.

The Line Combinations were as follows…

• Daniel Paille-Marc Savard-Blake Wheeler
• Marco Sturm-Patrice Bergeron-Mark Recchi
• Vladimir Sobotka-David Krejci-Michael Ryder
• Matt Hunwick-Steve Begin-Shawn Thornton

• Zdeno Chara-Derek Morris
• Dennis Wideman-Andrew Ference
• Mark Stuart-Johnny Boychuk

Scoring Summary…

• BOS: Mark Stuart assisted by Daniel Paille and Johnny Boychuk
• BOS: Derek Morris assisted by Zdeno Chara and Michael Ryder (PPG)
• BOS: David Krejci - unassisted
• TOR: Mikhail Grabolvski assisted by Niklas Hagman and Jason Blake
• TOR: Nikolai Kulemin assisted by Tomas Kaberle and Mike Komisarek
• BOS: Mark Recchi assisted by Blake Wheeler and David Krejci (PPG)
• BOS: Mark Recchi assisted by Marco Sturm and Patrice Bergeron

Bruins goal videos…

• Stuart - Will Ferrell scoring a goal and celebrating in Elf
• Morris - Snoopy Christmas
• Krejci - The Heat Miser from A Christmas Without Santa Claus
• Recchi - Chris Farley dancing dressed as Santa Claus on SNL
• Recchi - Dancing bear

Warmup Music…

• Jay-Z - “One Republic”
• Chamillionaire - “Ridin' Dirty”
• Rihanna feat. Jay-Z and Lil Wayne - “Run This Town”
• Eminem - “Lose Yourself”