This one wasn't the domination the Bruins displayed on Monday.
This was about survival. It was about finding a way to win even when you weren't necessarily the best team on the ice on that particular night.
And that's exactly what the Bruins did in their 3-2 victory Carolina on Tuesday.
After routing the Hurricanes 7-0 in Boston the previous day, the Bruins knew they would come at them much harder on the back end of the home-and-home series down in Carolina. But the Bruins couldn't have anticipated the onslaught the Hurricanes threw at them.
After the Bruins got off to a solid start that featured Johnny Boychuk's first goal of the season just 2:04 into play, Carolina quickly took control. The Hurricanes finished the first period with a 19-11 edge in shots and Jussi Jokinen's late goal pulled them even heading into the second, which the Bruins had to start shorthanded after Tim Thomas took a roughing call at the end of the first for a gloved punch at Zach Boychuk.
That was about the only mistake Thomas made on the night. He withstood everything Carolina threw at him, as the Hurricanes outshot Boston 19-9 in the second, but came away from the period still in a 1-1 deadlock.
"They pushed really hard," Thomas said after making a season-high 43 saves. "They had the pressure for the majority of the night, but we found a way to win.
"We started off with my penalty, so obviously I had to try really hard to kill that one off," Thomas added. "Then we got a couple more penalties, probably because their legs were fresher than ours. They were faster than us for awhile. But we battled to get through that. We dodged a bullet there, and we had to find a way to win it there in the third period and we did." 
The Bruins actually started to get things turned around late in the second, when the fourth line finally slowed Carolina's momentum with a hard-working shift down low by Shawn Thornton, Greg Campbell and Blake Wheeler.
Boston carried that momentum into the third, and pulled ahead when Brad Marchand scored his 10th goal of the year. Carolina answered, but Milan Lucic put the Bruins up for good with a power-play strike at 11:49. Steven Kampfer started the play by gaining the blue line with speed, then Mark Recchi took it down the left wing and behind the net before finding Lucic all alone out front for the big winger's first goal in 13 games.
"No matter what the score is we've always been able to play our game in the third," Lucic said. "You've got to give them credit, they came at us hard. I felt like we had a good start, but then we started to get into a bit of penalty trouble. They gained momentum and kept rolling with it.
"That's when we needed Tank [Thomas] to step up and play big and he did," Lucic added. "He made a lot of key saves and we came back in the second intermission and talked about getting back to getting pucks in deep. When we were playing the puck possession game down low, that's when we were creating most of our chances. That's what we did in the third and I think that's why we won."
The Bruins did finally put together a decent period in the third, holding Carolina to just seven shots after allowing 19 in each of the first two frames. But the overall numbers were still ugly.
The Bruins were outshot 45-28, and Carolina actually attempted an amazing 87 shots in 60 minutes. The Bruins had 28 blocks, including 19 from the defense. Dennis Seidenberg led the way with five, but every blueliner had at least two blocked shots.
The Bruins were on the receiving end of other kinds of punishment as well, as they were also outhit 43-19, and those numbers actually improved as the night wore on as Carolina's edge stood at 27-4 midway through the second period. The Hurricanes, helped by all that hitting, also had a 20-9 advantage in takeaways.
Just about every number on the stat sheet was slanted heavily in Carolina's favor, except the one that counted most on the scoreboard. And that's what made this win especially important, as the Bruins found a way to win even on a night when they probably should not have.
"The first 10 minutes of the first period I thought we came out real well, then they kind of took the game over from there," Bruins coach Claude Julien said. "We really struggled through that second period, but the third period at least we came back and battled hard and found a way to win. So at the end of the night you knew it was going to be hard but you found a way to win the hockey game and that's what matters."
