Bruins Dump Devils To Extend Point Streak To 17 Games

The Bruins played a rather uninspired first period and were fortunate Tuukka Rask was on his A game early.  The Devils put up 20 shots on the goal during the first period, the most shots the Bruins have given up in a single period this season.  Thankfully, Rask was able to keep New Jersey off the scoreboard.

Things picked up in the second period as the Devils opened the scoring just over two minutes in. Former Boston College Eagle Miles Wood set up shop in front of the Bruins net and redirected a point shot by Will Butcher past Rask.

Just under five minutes later the Bruins got some puck luck to tie the game. After Danton Heinen won a board battle in the left corner, Riley Nash quickly shot the puck from just above the goal line and it deflected off the stick of Sami Vatanen to go up and over Cory Schneider for his seventh goal of the year.

The Devils were able to regain the lead exactly two minutes later on a play that had bad news in both ends of the ice for the Bruins.  Shortly after Patrice Bergeron was knocked down by getting hit by a Torey Krug slap shot, Damon Severson finished off an odd man rush by tipping a pass from Marcus Johansson into the Bruins net.

The Bruins took the lead with just 33 seconds remaining in the second period as David Pastrnak chipped the puck into the neutral which led to an odd man rush.  Marchand looked off the pass and deked Schneider down to the point where he was able to flip a backhand shot over his glove hand for his 21^st goal of the season. 

A couple minutes later, the Bruins got a two-man advantage for a full two minutes.  They cashed in to tie the game at the 12:53 mark as Brad Marchand found Bergeron in the high slot where he quickly fired the puck past Schneider. Krug had the secondary assist on Bergeron's 20^th goal, which made the Bruins the first team in the NHL have three different 20-goal scorers this year.

There was a long delay after the goal because of issues with the official time clock and which player was to come out of the penalty box. After a good five minutes of discussion, the game finally returned to action.

Schneider appeared to hurt himself trying to stop the Bergeron goal, but was able to stay in the game. However, he remained in the Devils locker room after the second intermission and was replaced by rookie Ken Appleby.

The Bruins were outshot 12-4 in the third period and had to kill off a late interference penalty by Adam McQuaid, but there were able to hang on. They have now won 21 of the last 26 games against the Devils.

The Bruins will travel to Ottawa for a matchup with the Senators on Thursday before heading into the All-Star Break.