It was Trent Frederic who was credited with boosting the Boston Bruins’ momentum in their comeback win over the Washington Capitals on Feb. 1.
And Friday it was Connor Clifton’s turn.
The young defenseman dropped the gloves with Nicolas Aube-Kubel in the first period of the B’s 2-1 comeback win over the Philadelphia Flyers on Friday night.
Clifton’s tussle, much like Frederic’s, created a spark the Bruins needed to overcome a deficit. Even though they had to fight back from just one goal this time around, Clifton’s teammates and head coach knew they needed something to get the team going.
And that’s exactly what the blueliner did.
“He wants to prove he belongs,” Cassidy said after the game. “That scrap was great. Got us going a little bit. Good for Cliffy. Plays hard, practices hard. I’m happy for him. He’s always going to be physical.”
Sean Kuraly, who scored the game-winning goal with an absolute laser in the third period, echoed Cassidy’s sentiments.
“He’s a guy you love having on your team,” he said. “I think you can see what we love about Cliffy. … We call him Cliffy Hockey because he just goes out and plays.”
Brad Marchand, like Kuraly and Cassidy, couldn’t find enough good things to say about Clifton.
“He did a great job getting us going with that fight,” Marchand said. “He’s always physical, he plays hard. He’s tough to play against even in practice. He created a lot of great offense, too, had some really good looks, made some really good plays. Cliffy was one of our better players tonight, so, gotta give him a lot of credit.”
Here are some other notes from Friday’s Bruins-Flyers game:
— Tuukka Rask made a crucial save on a Joel Farabee penalty shot.
In hindsight, that save was a big difference in the outcome of the win.
— Chris Wagner did not take a shift in the third period after taking a late penalty the frame prior.
Cassidy confirmed it was a coach’s decision and not due to injury.
“He’s fine,” Cassidy said.
— David Pastrnak stayed hot with an assist on Marchand’s game-tying goal.
— Cassidy knows his team took a little bit to get going. But at the end of the day, it’s a team effort.
“Clearly we didn’t have our legs early on,” Cassidy said. “Tail end of the road trip. We found a way to keep ourselves in the game. … It takes 20 guys. … Leaders lead, followers follow and I thought our followers followed real well.”
— The Bruins, as they have so many times this season, played from behind and picked up the W. And Cassidy pinpointed what the team has done well during that stretch.
“It can be a mental block if it goes the other, if you never come back,” Cassidy said. “… For us, knowing we’re behind knowing that there’s goals in that room, you don’t panic, you don’t try to do it yourself and you don’t gamble and say, ‘well, we’re gonna need it now’ and take yourself out of the game. I think that’s what we’ve done well, we haven’t taken ourselves out of the game while we’ve been pushing.”
And even though they’ve had to come back quite a bit this season, it’s not something the Bruins “want to live by.”
“It’s not easy to do and it’s not something we wanna live by,” Cassidy added. “And we’ve said that, that you can’t trail every game expecting to come back. But it’s how you end up trailing, I think that’s important. Tonight, we didn’t have our best. But we hung around and found a way to stay in the game.”
— Boston now has a bit of an unexpected break due to its next two games against the Buffalo Sabres getting postponed. The Black and Gold will be back in action Wednesday against the New York Rangers.
