Bruins Notes: Boston ‘Wears Down’ Blue Jackets Defense Leading To Win

BOSTON — The Boston Bruins needed all 60 minutes to take down the Columbus Blue Jackets on Saturday.

While the score was 5-2 on paper, two empty-net goals really created a misleading final score. In fact, the game was tied until 16:06 in the final frame, when Erik Haula capped off his big night with a game-deciding goal.

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The Bruins spent most of the game on the Blue Jackets’ side of the ice but could not pull away until the final minutes. Head coach Bruce Cassidy believes all of that time in their zone wore down the Blue Jackets’ defense.

“I think that’s how we’re creating a lot of offense tonight by pressuring their defense,” Cassidy said. “Their goalie was seeing the puck well so we needed second and third efforts around the net to get it by him so those are things we talked about between periods. We took it to heart and as a result, they were getting it out and changing a lot, that’s what happens, right?

“We’ve started winning that, I don’t want to say field position but that puck possession battle where they’re fatigued by time they get (the puck) so they can’t go and attack and that’s what I think happened in the third, eventually you wear them down. We got a call, took advantage of it.”

The Bruins certainly looked like they were applying the pressure, which eventually led to a score in the third, and then two more to put the game on ice.

Here are more notes from Bruins-Blue Jackets:

— Cassidy expected Jeremy Swayman to be as good as he’s been this season, sort of.

“That’s a good question, because the way he played last year, I expected he would be good for us,” Cassidy said when speaking on whether Swayman has exceeded expectations following his 20th win. “How’s the team playing in front of them? I think it’s been good. To be perfectly honest. I think we’ve defended very well from the start of the year until now. The offense has really picked up the second half here so no, I don’t think he’s exceeded but we’re certainly pleased with where he’s at. I thought he’d have a good year for us.

“This summer, we talked about that and he had a good training camp, got off to a good start, built from where he left off, then, a bit of the unknown was it sort of, a legit 10 to 12 games or whatever he played at the end of last year or not?”

After some self-deliberation, Cassidy slightly changed his answer.

“Maybe he’s exceeded a little bit but all in all we had faith in Swayman giving us quality starts.”

— Derek Forbort got stuck in an elevator before the game, which provided an unexpected twist in the postgame press conference.

“Now Forbert, unfortunately, got stuck in an elevator today,” Cassidy said with a chuckle. “He had a little bit of an emergency getting over here, so we’re going to excuse him a little bit for taking a while to get his legs going, because I thought he wasn’t clean early on.”

— Nick Foligno was very grateful and humbled by his 1,000th game ceremony. He actually reached the milestone last month, but the ceremony was held Saturday against his former team.