Jim Montgomery Issues Reality Check After Bruins’ Game 1 Win

Jim Montgomery was pleased with the result Monday night and he can see the Bruins are in a great spot mentally coming off their thrilling first-round series win.

That said, Boston’s head coach wasn’t completely thrilled with the way his team played to open up Round 2.

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A four-goal win over the high-powered Florida Panthers would lead you to believe the Bruins played lights out at Amerant Bank Arena. But as Montgomery stressed after the series opener, there’s plenty of room for improvement going into Game 2.

“I will say, I thought our effort was good. I thought we were physical. I don’t think our execution was close to where it needs to be,” Montgomery told reporters, per a team-provided video.

The Bruins coach added: “We made a lot of mistakes. And if it’s not for Jeremy Swayman, that would have been a really — a lot closer game and maybe they come out on top. Like, we didn’t have enough scoring chances. Yeah, the score is not indicative of the way the game went.”

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The Stanley Cup playoffs are a marathon, and teams occasionally need things to bounce their way in order to play into June. Boston was fortunate to catch some breaks Monday evening, but as Montgomery explained, it will need to put together more complete performances if it wants to add more wins against a team as good as Florida.

The Bruins will try to put forth a better product Wednesday night in the Sunshine State. Puck drop is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. ET.