Because of COVID-19 restrictions and travel complications, the NHL was forced into reshuffling their divisions to work around them. Although people will miss the Saturday night games against Toronto at the Garden, rivalry night against Montreal, even their defending champion foes the Tampa Bay Lightning who always seem to bring out the best in the Boston Bruins, it was necessary to get the sport going in the midst of the COVID crisis.
Escaping the Lightning, who have knocked the Bruins out of the playoffs emphatically in two of the last three years, came at a cost. The East division plater withheld a mix of experienced, veteran hockey clubs and fast, youthful teams hoping to compete. Some were skeptical for what this would mean for the Bruins in 2021. The Capitals have firepower, versatility, and a quick, mobile d-core, not to mention the addition of Zdeno Chara. The Flyers have a perfect mix of veterans and young players and look like a team that is set for a five-year run. And the Penguins are, well, the Penguins. And then you have those young teams. You have the Sabres looking to finally break into the postseason backed by superstar center Jack Eichel. You have the Rangers, a team looking to lean on Artemi Panarin, Mika Zibanejad and first-overall pick Alexis Lafrenierre to do the scoring. You have New Jersey, who have already beaten the Bruins in a game this season and give them hell in another; who knows, they could surprise backed by a pair of recent first-overall picks and a sneaky good, young defense core. And mixed in there is the Islanders, a stingy team who’s rock-solid defensive system makes them seem impenetrable at times; how soon we forget they made it a few wins away from an appearance in the Stanley Cup Final. As far as where Boston stood in all this, they entered the year missing David Pastrnak, they have a big question mark revolving around the production, or lack-there-of of the second line, and a defense in transition with young guys looking to assume bigger roles all over.
But despite widespread criticism on the build of the team, they’ve established that they are a team to beat in the East, even with consistent key absences in their lineup through the first ten games of the year. And some of the teams they were meant to struggle against, they’ve handled just fine in the early-stages of the year. They proved that they are able to beat the Washington Capitals, so long as they have a good start to the game and refuse to be out-worked which we saw at times in this most recent series. They emphysically defeated the Penguins and the Flyers. They lost to the Islanders 1-0, their only regulation loss of the season, during a stage of the year where they were parched for 5v5 offense. That issue has since been neutralized. I mentioned the Devils, who split the season-opening two game series with us in close, hard-fought games. They are yet to play Buffalo or the NY Rangers, but are surely favorites against those teams too.
It‘s still early in the season, and a lot can change. But their offense has been clicking even with key absences, their defense looks sharp and the young guys taken on bigger roles have proven capable of handling them. And they’ve gotten fair goaltending that will only go up from here with one of the best tandems in the business with Rask and Halak. The doubters who had us missing the postseason entirely, think again; the Bruins are still here, the culture in that dressing room is second-to-none in the National Hockey League, and they aren’t ready for the championship window to be closed quite yet.
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