Maroon Wants Bruins To Be ‘Pissed Off’

Boston Bruins winger Pat Maroon thinks he and his teammates should be ‘pissed off’ at the shenanigans that took place in their 6-1 Game 2 loss to the Florida Panthers, specifically after he was banished to the dressing room with 9:35 left in the game.

Maroon and Florida Panthers forward Nick Cousins were both given 10-minute misconducts at 10:25 of the third period, with Maroon getting an extra two minutes for roughing. Maroon, like so many in the arena and watching at home, was left wondering why he was given a misconduct.

“No,” Maroon replied when asked by Boston Hockey Now on Friday morning if he was ever given an explanation. “I was just confused, but it’s over, and I’m moving on.”

What he’s not, and doesn’t want his team to move on from, is the actions of the Florida Panthers players, specifically star winger Matthew Tkachuk, after Maroon was no longer in the game. The Panthers were taking runs at the Bruins, and Tkachuk wound up challenging Boston Bruins star winger David Pastrnak to a fight. Pastrnak obliged, and while he didn’t win the fight, he earned the respect of his teammates for standing up to the Panthers agitator.

“I think guys should be pissed off for sure,” Maroon replied when asked if he thought there would be a carryover from Game 2 and the between-the-whistles actions of the Panthers.

“That’s obviously not the way we want to play, and then obviously, you saw what happened after that, so I think guys should come out and be ready to play.

There has been plenty of speculation that Tkachuk wouldn’t have targeted and challenged Pastrnak and that the Panthers would not have tried some other questionable plays if the 6-foot-3, 234-pound winger had still been in the game. The same could probably be said if 6-foot-3, 220-pound Trent Frederic and 6-foot-5, 220-pound Justin Brazeau had not been given 10-minute misconducts as well.

“I mean, I don’t know,” Maroon replied when asked if Tkachuk’s and the Panthers’ actions were calculated with him not in the game anymore.

“You can’t really think about that but for me, I know what happened so. …you just gotta focus on the game. You can’t be going out there and taking stupid penalties. There are guys who are willing, and there are guys who are not, and unfortunately, there’s no one over there right now. But you just gotta play smart between the whistles; you don’t want to put your team on the penalty kill.”

The Bruins and Panthers will play Game 3 at TD Garden at 7 p.m. ET on Friday night (TNT, MAX, truTV, SN, CBC, TVAS).