Bruins Notes: Dominant Win Still Not Boston’s Best 60-Minute Effort

The Boston Bruins absolutely dominated the Nashville Predators on Thursday night.

After losing four of five to finish out January, many would consider the 5-0 victory one of Boston’s best since the calendar turned to 2023. That’s not the case according to Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery, however.

In fact, it wasn’t even Boston’s best effort in the last two games.

“I thought our 60 minutes in Dallas was much better,” Montgomery said, as seen on NESN’s postgame coverage.

Short and sweet.

What did the bench boss think about Boston as a whole on Thursday? He was much more complimentary.

“Our defense to offense was really good, our offense to defense way not,” Montgomery said. “We gave up a lot of odd-man rushes, so thank god Swayman was so good tonight.”

Bruins Wrap: Boston’s Dominance Returns In Rout Of Predators

Feb 16, 2023

Here are more notes from Thursday’s Bruins-Predators game:

— Patrice Bergeron snapped Boston’s 0-for-21 drought on the power play in the second period. The captain tied Cam Neely with 129 career power-play goals, good for fourth in Bruins history.

“Of course you want results,” Bergeron said postgame, as seen on NESN. “But, first and foremost you want to create some momentum out of it.”

— Hampus Lindholm tallied two assists against Nashville — one on Bergeron’s power-play goal and another on Trent Frederic’s game capper — to bring his career total to 200.

— Jeremy Swayman finished with 29 saves in his shutout, his second of the season. In his last 12 starts, the 24-year-old is 8-1-3 with a .937 save percentage, according to Scott McLaughlin of WEEI.

— An angry Predators fan chucked a dead catfish onto the ice as time was winding down in the second period, prompting a funny response from the Bruins backstop.

— The Bruins will head back to TD Garden on Saturday to start a quick two-game homestand. First up: The New York Islanders. Puck drop is scheduled for 5 p.m. ET. You can watch the game, plus an hour of pregame coverage, on NESN.