Game 43 Live Blog: Boston Bruins Vs. Washington Capitals

BOSTON – Here are five thoughts from the first period with the Boston Bruins up 2-1 on the Washington Capitals after the opening 20 minutes at TD Garden.

• First truly rough shift for Mike Reilly since arriving in Boston to end the first period. He makes a poor decision to pinch up 2-0 in the final 20 seconds of the first, and then fails to get back in D-zone coverage around the net when Tuukka Rask can’t cleanly handle the Nicklas Backstrom shot. TJ Oshie flicked the puck in for the easy, uncontested goal. Charlie McAvoy also got danced by Backstrom on the way to the net drive, so there were a lot of bad things happening at once on that play for the Boston Bruins.
• Yet another shorthanded goal by Brad Marchand and Patrice Bergeron, who are undoubtedly the best PK duo of their generation. Marchand hustled and freed up a puck from John Carlson on the forecheck that popped right to Bergeron in front of the net for the short-handed strike. Both of those players continue to do major damage shorthanded this season, and every season, for the Black and Gold.

• How did Garnet Hathaway not get anything called with a late hit to end the first period, but Nic Dowd and Curtis Lazar get matching penalties in the fracas that followed? Refs are going to lose control of this game quickly if that’s the way they’re going to call it.

How Dowd and Lazar get penalized here and Hathaway gets nothing is pretty astounding https://t.co/u7NTQ0P9EX

— Joe Haggerty (@HackswithHaggs) April 18, 2021

• Another 5-on-5 goal fort the second line with David Krejci tapping one in at the back post on a feed from Connor Clifton. They have begun scoring during even strength every single game since Taylor Hall arrived, even if he didn’t factor into that goal.

• Tuukka Rask looking a little rusty today with the glove hand. A few pucks he didn’t catch cleanly and then he couldn’t come up with that Nicklas Backstrom shot at the end of the period that led to the Washington goal.