Francona Wins Big in Return to Fenway

Connelly’s Top Ten: Rask Falls on Face

Bruins Lose 4-3 in OT as Rangers Fight to Stay Alive

For the Bulletin Board: Lundqvist’s “Lucky Bounces,” Savard’s “#ByeByeTorts”

Despite Good Performance, Bruins Fall to Rangers

The Bruins did pretty well defensively, but with a largely impotent offense, Boston fell to the New York Rangers 1-0. Tuukka Rask did well in goal, save for the one tip-in blemish. Just before, Michael Sauer of the Rangers, in the offensive zone, reached across the blue line to drag the puck towards him. Without definitive possession, it should have been off-sides, and brought a face-off into the neutral zone. When a face-off was given later in the play (in the offensive zone), the Rangers immediately shot the puck and got fortunate on the tip-in. Fortunately, a power play didn’t help the Rangers further, to which some sloppy play from Boston could have contributed.

The 2nd Period was more tame, compared to all that excitement over the missed call. Boston had their only power play of the game, between two more Rangers’ power plays, all unsuccessful. The biggest event in the 2nd was when Henrik Lundqvist, in net for New York, was collided with and sent crashing into the net. With play stopped, the trainer came out to check on him. Without any symptoms of a concussion, Lundqvist was able to remain in the game instead of heading down the tunnel for some quiet time.

The Rangers got one more power play chance in the 3rd when Milan Lucic was given his second slashing call of the night, on some seemingly innocent stick-on-stick contact fighting for the puck. After that didn’t pan out, Boston really turned up the heat with a little more than six minutes remaining. For about four minutes, the Bruins kept up an almost nonstop assault for about four minutes. Lot of blocks and saves only deflected the puck until Lundqvist finally caught the puck and took a face-off. With a few more minutes of flicking the puck away from goal, New York bled out the clock and took the win.

JERRY!! JERRY!! Moment of the Game:

The game’s one fight came 2:44 into the game, when Gregory Campbell got into it with Sean Avery. Avery got hold of the back of Campbell’s jersey and spun him around before taking him down after a few traded punches. Avery got in some extracurricular shots after Campbell was on the ground, and despite going down the tunnel, was not given a misconduct penalty.

Coach’s Corner

“It took us a little while to get going.” – Coach Claude Julien on Boston’s overall performance.

Scoring Summary

Penalty Summary

Goalie Stats

Shots on Goal

Game Notes

• Legendary Bruins’ radio announcer Bob Wilson had his microphone retired, and had the radio booth named in his honor.
• The TD Garden sold out a Bruins game for the 66th straight time.
• Lundqvist played his 400th career game, and racked up his career best 20th straight start.
• The Bruins’ streak of scoring 11 straight goals was snapped; it was their longest since scoring 14 straight in December of 1987.
• The Rangers are 27-0-0 this season when leading after the 2nd Period; they’re the NHL’s only perfect such team.
• Meanwhile, the Bruins are 5-16-5 when trailing after the 2nd.
• Lindqvist, in 22 games in his career against Boston, has five shutouts.
• Rask is a paltry 1-2-1 this season when giving up just one goal.

East Conference Playoff Situation

Table Legend

x-clinched playoff spot
o-eliminated from playoff conention

Tags: Bob Wilson, Bruins, Claude Julien, Gregory Campbell, Mark Recchi, Milan Lucic, New York Rangers, Tuukka Rask, Tyler Seguin, Zdeno Chara