Game 7 Live Blog: Boston Bruins Vs. Pittsburgh Penguins

BOSTON — Here are Five Thoughts from the second period:

— While the youth movement on the Boston Bruins blue line has gone much better than many – except Brandon Carlo and his blue line teammates – expected. One trending negative though has been the opponents’ ability to suddenly and completely take over the game. A perfect example of this was the first five minutes of the second period as the Penguins were just buzzing around the ice and more so in the offensive zone. One of the young blueliners’ best attributes though, has been survival and that’s what they did early in the period. 

— The Pens were buzzing early in the middle frame but again the Boston Bruins survived and in the process held the Penguins to just one shot despite all that Penguins puck possession. That seemed to grab the momentum back even more and a few minutes later, the Bruins grabbed a 3-1 lead when Patrice Bergeron notched his fourth goal of the season at 8:13 from Matt Grzelcyk and Charlie Coyle. Great to see Grzelcyk factor in the scoring after missing Tuesday’s game. As for the Bruins captain, well that’s just a leader leading the way and rewarding his teammates for some Selke worthy play at the other end. 

Patrice Bergeron extends the #NHLBruins lead, 3-1 pic.twitter.com/kIPxNSNvzU

— Marina Maher (@marinakmaher) January 29, 2021

— A rather questionable at best, interference call on Boston Bruins defenseman Jeremy Lauzon sent the Penguins to their second power play of the game at 13:40. The Bruins PK came up huge again though and preserved the two-goal lead. Bergeron and Lauzon had words with the referee Tim Peel. Was it a coincidence that Wagner then had a questionable holding call goa against him 18:35 into the period? I don’t know about you but I’m finding interesting how players and ref’s interact now even more since each division has its own group of referees.

— Jaro Halak wasn’t really tested much in the first period except for the shot from Cody Ceci he didn’t stop. Halak had five saves in the second period but they were all solid scoring chances.

— The new third line of Bjork-Kuraly-Wagner continued to be the best line on the ice there and Bjork got a well-earned scoring chance in the final seconds. He’s either redeeming himself now or increasing his trade value. …or both, but the banged-up Bruins will take it. 

Boston Bruins Lines

Forwards:

Brad Marchand – Patrice Bergeron – Craig Smith

Nick Ritchie – David Krejci – Charlie Coyle

Anders Bjork – Sean Kuraly – Chris Wagner

Trent Frederic – Par Lindholm – Jack Studnicka

Defense:

Jeremy Lauzon – Charlie McAvoy

Matt Grzelcyk – Brandon Carlo

Jakub Zboril – Kevan Miller

Extras: John Moore, Connor Clifton

Goalies:

Jaro Halak

Daniel Vladar

Pittsburgh Penguins Lines

Forwards:

Guentzel-Crosby-Rust

Zucker-Malkin-Kapanen

McCann-Blueger-Tanev

O’Connor-Jankowski-Sceviour/Lafferty

Defense:

Czuczman-Letang

Marino-Ceci

Joseph-Ruhwedel

Goalies:

Tristan Jarry

Casey DeSmith