That was a nice tuneup to the much anticipated Winter Classic! The Bruins shutout the Atlanta Thrashers Wednesday night at the TD Garden 4-0 behind Tuukka Rask’s second shutout of the season. Going into this game, I was a little worried that the Bruins wouldn’t be totally ready for this game because I figured their heads would be preoccupied on Friday.
I was really shocked to see Atlanta netminder Ondrej Pavelec lead Atlanta onto the ice for the pregame warmup since he was lifted just last Wednesday after allowing 3 goals on 10 shots in the Bruins' 6-4 win. I didn’t think that would happen again. The Bruins jumped on the board first just over six minutes into the contest as Sugar Shawn Thornton fired the puck around the wall, then Matt Hunwick jumped up into the play and fluttered a wristshot which Byron Bitz creatively redirected through his own legs and past Pavelec to give Boston a 1-0 lead. Boston then struck again as rookie phenom Evander Kane was called for a 2 minute minor for highsticking Johnny Boychuk (it should have been 4 minutes since Boychuk was cut); the Bruins converted again as Marco Sturm picked up the garbage on the rebound of a Marc Savard booming slapshot from about eight feet out that rang off the post, and Sturm tucked in it to make it 2-0. They weren’t done as Steve Begin redirected a Derek Morris one timer from the point; the puck went off Stevie B’s leg and in the net. The referees reviewed it, I'm not sure why, but the Bruins took a 3-0 lead, and for the second time in a week, that was the night for Ondrej Pavelec as his career stats versus Boston read as follows: 16 minutes, 6 goals allowed on 20 shots. That is not good. After one period, the B’s had a nice 3-0 lead.
The Bruins kept up the strong play in the second period as they continued to dominate Atlanta, especially sniper and potential future Bruin Ilya Kovalchuk. To be honest, I didn’t even notice him out there on the ice at all. I know I saw him in warmups, but he wasn’t a scoring threat all night as Zdeno Chara did a real nice job shutting him down. I really want Kovalchuk here in Boston; I’ve always loved him, and I believe a tandem of Savard and Kovalchuk would be the best 1-2 combo in Boston since Cam Neely and Adam Oates. The B’s added to their lead just as a powerplay expired when Blake Wheeler made a great individual effort to get the puck to Mark Recchi, who slid a nice pass across the top the crease to Patrice Bergeron, and Bergeron slapped it into the back of the net to make it 4-0. Earlier in the day, Patrice had been named to the Team Canada Olympic team. I was real happy for Bergy, and he’s come such a long way after sustaining a pair of career threatening head injuries over the past two years. In other Winter Olympic news, David Krejci, Zdeno Chara and Marco Sturm will also be representing their countries as Krejci will be playing for the Czech Republic, Chara for Slovakia, and Sturm will captain the Germany team (I believe he’s the only NHL German-born player going to Vancouver). Tim Thomas will find out tomorrow if he will be named to the USA Olympic team; I’d say he’s a lock, and although he definitely won’t start over Ryan Miller, the fact that he should be going is such a good story for Timmy.
The Bruins won the game 4-0, and like I said earlier, it was a really nice tuneup for the Winter Classic which promises to be absolutely epic and unforgettable. I have an amazing seat for this event; I’m about 30 rows off the field on the third base side with the Bruins coming at me twice. I can’t wait for this, and last night I purchased my official Winter Classic program since I wanted to avoid all the chaos at Fenway and not worry about lugging it around with me. My next blog promises to cover every angle of the Classic, from my first beer early in the morning with all my friends, to the pregame ceremonies, to the puck drop, to the last horn. I’ve never been so excited to go to Fenway. Currently, the forecast is calling for cloudy skies, a high of 36 and a few sprinkles…whatever, I think I can handle it!
The Line Combinations were as follows…
- Steve Begin-Marc Savard-Marco Sturm
- Blake Wheeler-David Krejci-Michael Ryder
- Daniel Paille-Patrice Bergeron-Mark Recchi
- Shawn Thornton-Vladimir Sobotka-Byron Bitz
- Dennis Wideman-Zdeno Chara
- Andrew Ference-Johnny Boychuk
- Matt Hunwick-Derek Morris
Scoring Summary…
- BOS: Byron Bitz assisted by Shawn Thornton and Matt Hunwick
- BOS: Marco Sturm assisted by Dennis Wideman and Marc Savard (PPG)
- BOS: Steve Begin assisted by Derek Morris and Marc Savard
- BOS: Patrice Bergeron assisted by Blake Wheeler and Mark Recchi
Bruins Goal Videos…
- Bitz: Batman celebrating after beating up the villains
- Sturm: John Travolta and Uma Thurman dancing in Pulp Fiction
- Begin: Three Stooges dancing
- Bergeron: Champagne popping scene in Wedding Crashers
Warmup Music…
- Jay-Z feat. Lil Wayne - “One Republic”
- Shop Boyz - “Party Like A Rock Star”
- Flo Rida - “Low”
- Rihanna feat. Jay-Z, Lil Wayne and Kanye West - “Run This Town”
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