Patrice Bergeron’s four goals lift Bruins to victory

You can take a breath, Bruins fans. It appears both your captain — and your power play — are going to be OK.

Just as folks started to wonder aloud whether his 36-year-old body was finally slowing down after all the hard miles, Patrice Bergeron scored his first, second, third and fourth goals of the year — three on the man-advantage — to lift the B’s to their most complete victory of the season, a 5-1 drubbing of the Detroit Red Wings at the Garden on Thursday. It was easily the B’s most complete win of the season, as they outshot the Wings (missing their captain Dylan Larkin and defenseman Danny DeKeyser) to the tune of 37-15.

While there were plenty of attaboys to go around, the night belonged to Bergeron. Though his game has never been measured by pure goal-scoring, he certainly didn’t want to start the season with a goose egg for the first seven games. But when you’ve won a Stanley Cup, four Selkes and a slew of gold medals in international competition like Bergeron has, you’ve got a pretty good memory bank to draw on to get through any rough patch.

“Honestly, I think it’s one of those things where I’ve been in the league long enough to know it’s going to come back, right?” said Bergeron, who also won 16-of-19 faceoffs in a vintage performance. “I have the experience to rely on and I think it’s about making sure you don’t force plays or you don’t think about the end result, but go back to the details, make sure you play the right way, put yourself in good position and eventually it’s going to come your way. That’s how I was approaching it. Ultimately, you obviously want to produce, but that being said, the last thing you want to do is put pressure on your shoulders. That’s going to make it worse. It’s about doing the right things and making sure you do some other things to help the team win.”

One of the things the B’s coaching staff focused on during the four days in between games was the lagging power play. And when they got their first man advantage in the first period, the B’s showed they didn’t waste their practice time.

With Vladislav Namestnikov in the box for staying in the play after his helmet was knocked off, the B’s needed all of five seconds to cash in. Bergeron won the right-dot faceoff cleanly back to Charlie McAvoy, who in turn pushed it back down to Brad Marchand on the right wing. Marchand found Bergeron in his bumper position and the captain snapped his patented one-time half slapper past goalie Thomas Greiss at 11:03.

They made it look easy, but the evidence produced early this season says that it is clearly not.

Bergeron’s wing man Marchand had himself a night, too, getting the primary assist on all four of his centerman’s goals and should have had a fifth one but the still-struggling David Pastrnak whiffed on a one-timer with an open net.

“I felt better tonight,” said Marchand. “Taking care of pucks, that was one thing that was happening early (in the season), I was forcing a little bit too much. When that happens, you turn it over and end up playing defense a lot more than we normally do. Tonight, I think we took care of pucks a lot better through the neutral zone, got it in deep, and that’s when we’re really effective when we get in the zone.”

The Red Wings started to show a little bit of life in the second period and had the B’s penned in their own zone, forcing a couple of icings. Then, midway through the period, Tyler Bertuzzi made a terrific poke-check of McAvoy just outside the blue line to give Lucas Raymond a clean break-in. Jeremy Swayman (now 6-0-0 at the Garden in his young career) made the stop on Raymond, but as it turned out, it wouldn’t have counted anyway because Bertuzzi took a very ill-advised penalty behind the play.

The B’s then cashed in again on the PP. While this advantage wasn’t nearly as crisp as the first two, Marchand eventually tracked down a loose puck behind the Wings net and fed Bergeron out at the right circle. Once again, Bergeron picked his spot on the far blocker side and beat Greiss for the 2-0 lead at 10:52.

But the B’s did need their goalie in the period. Swayman preserved the two-goal lead with a beautiful save on Raymond on a backdoor play that looked like a sure goal.

And then the Wings tempted fate one more time before the period was out when Moritz Seider took a holding penalty on Karson Kuhlman when the fourth-liner took the puck hard to the net.

Bergeron completed the hat trick off a pass again from Marchand, burying it again from his office between the dots on the right side.

It wasn’t a perfect night for the captain. In the third period with Pastrnak already in the box for high-sticking, Bergeron took a tripping penalty, giving the Wings a lengthy 5-on-3. They capitalized with a Raymond backdoor goal.

But the captain’s mates would not let their captain feel too much shame. With Bergeron still in the box, the B’s regained their three-goal advantage with a shorthanded goal. Curtis Lazar was stopped on a partial breakaway but Mike Reilly scored the shorty on the rebound. It was Reilly’s first as a Bruin and first goal since Jan. 28, 2020.

Bergeron added his fourth of the year off the rush to finish it off and, for a night anyway, all was right in the B’s world.

from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/3GOJNHA