The Boston Bruins found themselves in a bit of a rut recently, but you’d never figure based on Tuesday’s performance.
Losers of their last two games, the B’s rolled into Nationwide Arena and delivered a 6-2 steamrolling of the red-hot Columbus Blue Jackets, who had won their last five games. With the win, the B’s kept the Blue Jackets from clinching a Wild Card spot, while Boston secured the second seed in the Atlantic Division after the Toronto Maple Leafs 4-1 loss to the Carolina Hurricanes on Tuesday.
Jake DeBrusk had a pair of goals in the win, while Marcus Johansson scored his first goal with the Bruins. Brad Marchand potted one of Boston’s other tallies and added an assist, bringing his point total for the season to 100. David Pastrnak and Karson Kuhlman had the B’s final two goals.
Oliver Bjorkstrand and Matt Duchene had Columbus’ goals.
Tuukka Rask made 32 saves for the Bruins, while Blue Jackets netminder Sergei Bobrovsky turned away 19 shots before getting pulled with four minutes left in the second period. Joonas Korpisalo made three saves in the final 24 minutes.
The Bruins climbed to 48-23-9 with the win, while the Blue Jackets fell to 45-31-4 with the loss.
Here’s how it all went down:
PUCK LUCK AND MOJO’S FIRST
The Bruins finished the first period ahead 2-0 thanks in part to some puck luck.
Just a few minutes into the game, David Krejci from the edge of the circle backhanded a pass to DeBrusk, who was in the slot. DeBrusk got his blade on it, but so too did David Savard, and the puck went spinning high into the air as a result. The puck ended up hitting the top of the net and bounced onto Bobrovsky’s back, then trickled into the net at 1:58.
Later in the period, Johansson, playing on the third line with Chris Wagner and Charlie Coyle, doubled the Bruins’ advantage.
A few feet from the post, Wagner tried to sneak a shot past Bobrovsky as he got shoved to the ice by Savard, but the netminder turned it away. The stop left a juicy rebound, with Coyle turning and firing the puck back on net from the slot. That shot also was stopped, but Johansson was right on the doorstep to bury the rebound and put the Bruins ahead 2-0 at 17:27.
The B’s ultimately outshot the hosts 11-8 in the first 20 minutes.
PILING ON
The Bruins doubled their first-period advantage, concluding the second with a 4-0 lead in tow.
Marchand got a puck from Pastrnak right on the doorstep, but instead of shooting, Marchand tried to feed it right back to his linemate. The Blue Jackets had created traffic in front of the net, so the puck didn’t get through, but it slid right back out to Marchand, who quickly finished past Bobrovsky at 15:14.
Less than a minute later, DeBrusk and Kuhlman dashed into the attacking zone, zipping passes back and forth. DeBrusk finally received the puck one last time and beat Bobrovsky at 16:00.
Boston won the second-period shots battle 13-9.
MARCHY GETS HIS 100th
The result wasn’t in doubt heading into the final period, but the B’s added another goal for good measure — and it was a historic one at that.
Marchand won a puck battle in the defensive zone and got the puck up to Pastrnak in the neutral zone. Pastrnak entered the attacking end with speed and rocketed a shot past Korpisalo just 34 seconds into the period.
The assist from Marchand makes him the Bruins’ first 100-point player since Joe Thornton did it in 2002-03.
Columbus did get a goal back at the 5:51 mark, with Bjorkstrand slapping home a shot on the power play with Marchand in the box for interference and Nick Foligno screening Rask.
That wasn’t all of the Blue jackets’ third-period scoring, either.
While on the power-play again, Artemi Panarin snuck a beautiful pass across the offensive zone to find Duchene, who one-timed a shot past Rask to cut the Bruins’ lead to 5-2.
Any signs of life the Jackets had were crushed by Kuhlman.
DeBrusk whiffed on a shot in the slot, however the puck kept sliding toward the left post. Neither Korpisalo nor Josh Anderson were able to get the puck to safety, and it found Kuhlman right on the doorstep. Kuhlman put Boston’s sixth goal away on what pretty much was a wide-open net at 10:28.
UP NEXT
The Bruins will conclude their three-game road trip with a tilt against the Minnesota Wild on Thursday. Puck drop from Xcel Energy Center is set for 8 p.m. ET.
This Bruins Wrap is presented by Plainridge Park Casino.
