Bruins Notes: Boston Enjoying Longest Winning Streak In Five Years

It’s been five years since a Boston Bruins team has gone on this kind of a streak.

The B’s picked up their seventh straight victory in a 3-2 shootout win against the Vegas Golden Knights on Wednesday night. The team is 4-0 on its Western Conference road trip with a chance to sweep the roadie Saturday against the St. Louis Blues, winners of their last 11.

The last streak of this magnitude was a 12-game winning streak in 2013-14.

Boston has picked up points in each of its last 12 games. The Bruins’ last regulation loss came on Jan. 19 against the New York Rangers.

And it took one heck of a marathon for the Bruins to continue racking up the points.

Boston twice held the lead over the Knights but was unable to sustain their lead.

Jaroslav Halak continued his recent tear, making 31 saves. He came up huge in overtime when the Bruins took a too many men on the ice penalty with 2:46 to play in the extra frame. He then stopped five of the six shots he faced in the shootout. The 33-year-old now is 3-0 with a .970 save percentage in his last three starts.

Here are other notes from Wednesday’s Bruins-Golden Knights game:

— Bruins coach Bruce Cassidy made an interesting decision in the sixth round of the shootout, turning to veteran David Backes. The 34-year-old was 1-for-7 in shootout attempts in his career, but he was able to sneak a wrist shot past the glove side of Marc-Andre Fleury to seal the win.

And Cassidy had a pretty simple answer as to why he turned to Backes, via the Boston Herald’s Marissa Ingemi.

With the Bruins picking up forward Charlie Coyle from the Minnesota Wild on Wednesday, Backes’ status on the bottom six will be somewhat of a question mark going forward.

— Jake DeBrusk continues to set the world on fire. After being held out of the goal column for a month, the 22-year-old winger has found the twine in each of his last five games. And DeBrusk scored one of his prettier goals Wednesday, receiving a pass behind his body, spinning, and firing a snipe past Fleury for his 19th goal of the season. He also put the B’s on the board in the shootout with a soft touch.

— Karson Kuhlman has been impressive on the second line in Peter Cehlarik’s absence. The rookie picked up an assist on DeBrusk’s goal, and more than that, his physicality kept the play alive.

He was rewarded with his first NHL assist.

— David Krejci picked up his 39th assist on DeBrusk’s goal and is one helper away from his first 40-assist season since 2014-15 when the center finished with 46.