Step outside just about anywhere in New England this week, and you can literally feel it in the air: It's time for the Bruins to begin another run in the Stanley Cup playoffs.
The B's are finally done with a history-making regular season, and after a brief moment to pause and celebrate, the Bruins are turning their attention to the postseason. Boston's chase for 16 more wins begins Monday night at TD Garden when it welcomes the Florida Panthers to town.
Here are four Bruins thoughts to chew on as you wait for the Round 1 series to begin.
Just how different is this team?
Obviously, the Bruins -- nor any team in NHL history -- has enjoyed the sort of regular-season success Boston enjoyed for the last 82 games. But it's not like the B's haven't had big years before. In the last 20 years, the Bruins have had 10 100-point seasons and obviously just one Stanley Cup to show for it. That's not necessarily a point made to illustrate how they have fallen short of the ultimate prize when they had one of the NHL's best teams. Rather, it's to point out just how hard it is to win the Cup. This certainly is the most success we've ever seen them have in the regular season, but what happens when they're down 2-1 in a series at some point? The vibes with Jim Montgomery steering the ship are through the roof. The buy-in has made the difference for six months when you could count on one hand the number of nights the B's no-showed. In the playoffs, though, everyone shows up ready to play. This is going to be more difficult. Is this team up for that challenge? Is it built for the challenge? Does Montgomery's system -- and personality -- put the Bruins in a better position to meet and surpass those challenges? They are fascinating questions that will start to be answered Monday night.
The luxury of Nick Foligno
The veteran Bruins winger says he expects to be ready to play by the start of the playoffs, but is he a lineup lock once cleared? The B's went 18-4-0 in the 22 games he missed. He's certainly a good NHL hockey player, but losing Foligno didn't kill the team. We also don't know where his conditioning is at. His last game was Feb. 28. Things are going to be a lot different on April 17, and it's unfair to say without any doubt he'll look like the same exact player -- against better, more consistent competition -- when he comes back. It's a long way of saying maybe Boston eases him back into the lineup or even holds off until it thinks a spark is needed. The additions of Tyler Bertuzzi and Garnet Hathaway could complicate the calculus a little bit. The great thing about Foligno is that he's as good of a dressing room guy as you can ask for. Just being around the team is value added from him. It might be a moot point. Montgomery loves Foligno, and he could probably take the fourth-line spot of A.J. Greer and give the Bruins a tenacious checking line. But the depth of this team allows Montgomery and company the ability to look at a variety of options. So even if Foligno needs a little more time, getting him back in the middle of the series could be a massive spark.
Beware of cat
The Bruins won more games than any team in history. They should be favored against everyone and not afraid of anyone. But … this isn't exactly the 1994 Rangers getting the No. 8 Islanders in the first round, a series the Blueshirts swept with an aggregate score of 22-3. The Panthers won the Presidents' Trophy just a year ago before choking in the playoffs. It looked like they were headed for a lost season this year, too, when they lost to the Kings on Jan. 27, their third straight defeat in a stretch of games in which they allowed 17 goals. From there, they went 19-10-2 to end the season and squeak into the playoffs, a 31-game run that began with … a 4-3 overtime win over the Bruins. The Panthers were one of just two teams (Ottawa the other) that beat the B's twice this season, scoring at least three goals in all four of the meetings. Florida has dynamic offensive firepower, led by Matthew Tkachuk (40 goals, 69 assists) and Aleksander Barkov (23-55-78). They were sneaky good five-on-five with just Carolina, New Jersey and Calgary posting a better scoring-chance ratio. The special teams are also fine, though they take a lot of penalties. Goaltending is the issue. The only thing more impressive than Sergei Bobrovsky's trophy room is his bank account, and the $10 million goalie has come nowhere near living up to his paystub. Alex Lyon has been a rock down the stretch, winning six of eight starts, but he's a 30-year-old who has 39 career (regular-season) starts under his belt. Linus Ullmark won 40 games in net for the Bruins this season. The Bruins should not lose this series, of course, but it might not be easy, either.
The East is a beast
It's impossible to say for sure an Eastern Conference team will capture the Stanley Cup, but it certainly wouldn't be surprising. The East is truly loaded, and with the way things fell, we have some must-see matchups in the first round.
We just got done talking about how the Panthers might be able to give the Bruins a bit of a push, and the rest of the series have the makings of long, competitive battles. That Devils-Rangers series is a nice hit of mid-90s nostalgia, and those barns are going to be rocking with the Tri-State clash. Don't sleep on Lightning-Maple Leafs, either. It feels like it's been locked in as a first-round matchup since Christmas, but those teams are among the five or six most talented in the league, and it wouldn't be surprising to see either not only knock off the Bruins but go all the way -- yes, even the Leafs.
