Boston Bruins
Bruins Survive Against Sabres Thanks To Khusnutdinov’s OT Winner
BOSTON — By their own admission, the Boston Bruins didn’t play their best game on Thursday night at TD Garden against the Buffalo Sabres.
However, they’re not ones to discredit a win, either, especially not after Marat Khunsnutdinov scored in overtime to lift them to a 4-3 victory.
“It was a crazy game,” Khusnutdinov said. “It’s unbelievable for me. It’s [my] first game on the first line. That was great for the team. Great for me.”
Getting an opportunity to play on Boston’s top line, Khusnutdinov was already having a solid performance to begin with. To cap it off, he rifled a shot from the top of the face-off circle off a three-on-one rush for the Bruins past Buffalo netminder Alex Lyon for his first goal of the season.
“He’s very fun to watch right now,” said Bruins coach Marco Sturm of Khusnutdinov. “That’s why I didn’t hesitate to put him out there. A player has to be ready when it’s when it’s when your opportunity comes up. Every time he was scratched, he worked. He worked really hard in practice, waited for his opportunity, and he took advantage.”
Marat Khusnutdinov already had a strong performance for the Bruins to begin with. Not many better ways to end a night than scoring the game-winner in OT.
pic.twitter.com/aQgL3l8VKc— Andrew Fantucchio (@A_Fantucchio) October 31, 2025
Under pressure of a relentless Sabres attack, the Bruins had to be opportunistic with their offense and even more stingy on defense. Making his second straight start, Joonas Korpisalo was under constant duress, stopping 37 of the 40 shots Buffalo challenged him with.
By comparison, the Bruins put just 22 shots on net. In fact, it wasn’t until 9:42 following the opening puck drop that they landed their first. Once they did, though, it didn’t take long for them to find the back of the net.
A goal on the man-advantage from Morgan Geekie started the scoring for the Bruins at 13:07. With a shot from the right face-0ff circle into the top corner, Geekie sniped his team-leading ninth goal of the season and seventh in the last six games.
“When you’re hot, you’re hot,” Sturm said. “This kid, he just needs to shoot the puck, and it’s going to go in.”
Never mind 50. With seven goals in his last six games, Morgan Geekie is currently on pace to break 60 this season.pic.twitter.com/B8u25DaUXI
— Andrew Fantucchio (@A_Fantucchio) October 30, 2025
Two minutes later, David Pastrnak created a turnover that led to a two-on-one rush that he finished himself, giving Boston a 2-0 advantage with his seventh goal of the year.
Rasmus Dahlin put Buffalo on the board at 16:01 of the second period with a blast from the point on the power play that Korpisalo never saw coming through heavy traffic in front. But with 21 seconds left until the intermission, Mark Kastelic got the goal back for Boston, diving to clean up a puck that loose in the crease to score his third goal of the season and make it 3-1 Bruins.
“The last like minute of a period is huge,” said Kastelic. “I think the most important thing is keeping it out of our net. But when there are opportunities to get one, it definitely is a backbreaker for the other team. When you got one late, it’s definitely deflating for them.”
Turns out it wasn’t all that deflating for the Sabres.
Buffalo cut Boston’s lead back down to one in the third period with 13 minutes left to go. After a shot from Alex Tuch handcuffed Korpisalo, the puck popped up into the air and fell right to Josh Doan on the doorstep, where he had no problem putting it into the back of the net.
With 5:35 left to play, Tuch tied the score with a goal of his own that survived a coach’s challenge by Boston for goaltender interference, leading the way to overtime and Khusnutdinov’s heroics.
Even while collecting the two points, the Bruins still suffered a significant loss as Elias Lindholm left the game during the second period and did not return due to a lower-body injury.
The Bruins did not have an update on Lindholm’s condition postgame. His status is currently unclear.
The Bruins will host the Carolina Hurricanes on Saturday afternoon at TD Garden.
Mrbruib4
October 30, 2025 at 11:40 pm
This win goes against everything Ricky believes in. Peanut gead lol
Geoff Ash
October 31, 2025 at 5:17 am
I was expecting to see Mr Murray’s negative take as well and this time I would have had to agree with him somewhat this was a game the Bruins had no buisness winning. Korpasalo played his best game as a Bruin he was under seige all night. I thought Sturm made the right call giving him the start and with thd state of our team thd compensation should be decided by performance and I would give Korpi the next start too and that may motivate Sway to get back to the level he was at in the past. I believe in him he’s just got to get his mojo back but that’s not easy playing with this D which was Spose to be our strength. I also got to shout out Jeanot I think he’s playing well in a bottom 6 role I just don’t like the money but I can see he’s a type of player we was missing it’s just too bad it’s not at half his cap hit ha ha go Bs
Sr
October 31, 2025 at 7:42 am
Happy for the KMan,he works very hard. The whole team is hardworking but they lack proven offensive players . Look at the standings the whole league is around 500. Major cluster Fu……! Be interesting to see what the team does if Lindholm out for a long period of time.
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