Bruins overcome late-game blues en route to 60th win

Even some late-game blues couldn’t stop the Boston Bruins from making more history in 2022-23.

Boston needed to survive a relentless St. Louis comeback bid over the final 20-plus minutes of play. Jordan Kyrou and ex-Bruin Torey Krug helped the Blues overcome a 3-0 deficit. The former bookended the come-from-behind effort with his late-second-period tally and the equalizer in the final seconds of regulation.

The Bruins encountered multiple chances in the three-on-three overtime. Jordan Binnington denied Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak’s breakaway bids. The St. Louis goalie also received a little luck when an offside review overturned Dmirty Orlov’s game-winner.

Binnington denied Jake DeBrusk in Round 2 of the shootout. The Bruins still one-upped St. Louis in the proverbial skills competition following Charlie Coyle’s marker and Linus Ullmark’s trio of saves on Kyrou, Brayden Schenn and Jakub Vrana.

The conclusion might have provided some concerns. But the start to the Bruins’ 4-3 win highlighted the continued growth in the depth scoring department.

With the Bruins providing a breather to their top defenseman (Charlie McAvoy) and first and second-line centers (Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci), the top nine paced Boston to a 3-0 lead.

St. Louis’ own Trent Frederic notched a pair of assists in front of his friends and family, beginning with a rather unique helper during a 2-on-1 sequence with Jake DeBrusk.

Frederic earned his second assist after Oskar Steen buried a juicy rebound past Binnington to become the 25th different Bruin to light the lamp.

Steen’s first of the season came a mere 44 ticks after Tyler Bertuzzi tapped in a stellar feed from Pastrnak to give the Bruins a 2-0 lead during a second-period power play attempt.

Between the depth scoring, clutch saves from Ullmark; an improved power play and timely penalty kills, the Bruins put themselves in a position to earn their 60th victory of the season.

It didn’t come easy, but in the end, a win is a win. Here’s what we learned as the Bruins will embark on some well-deserved rest before Thursday’s matchup with the Maple Leafs.

Bruins regroup after relinquishing their 3-0 lead.

Jim Montgomery’s cub encountered a few costly hiccups over the second half of Sunday’s matinee. The Blues had rode their momentum from Kyrou’s first tally at 19:51 of the middle frame, outworking the Bruins in puck battles and establishing a healthy rhythm in the attacking end.

The Bruins received timely saves from Ullmark over that stretch. The penalty kill held St. Louis’ power play to perimeter-based attempts during their pair of shorthanded situations, including a 5-on-3 scenario for 1:34.

But Boston couldn’t get that timely defensive stop late in regulation.

Against Boston’s fatigued fourth line, the Blues finally delivered the equalizer when Kryou fired a top-shelf wrister for his second goal of the afternoon.

The Bruins regrouped in overtime. Only an offside review and a pair of breakaway stops from Binnington prevented the B’s from exiting Enterprise Center with another historic win during the 3-on-3 extra session.

Despite the near misses in overtime, the Bruins persevered to a shootout win after Coyle’s Round 1 marker and Ullmark’s three stops.

“We always find a way to reset and regroup, and we always talk about staying in the moment,” Montgomery told TNT’s Darren Pang afterward. “I thought our guys did a good job of that because in the 3-on-3, we were pretty good.”

The Bruins’ historic regular season continues with 60th win

Facing an uncertain future beyond this season following a tumultuous summer, the Bruins entered their 2022-23 season with relatively lower expectations. A handful of hockey pundits in the U.S. and Canada expected the Bruins to remain in fringe playoff contention even with Krejci and Bergeron returning on incentive-based one-year deals.

Indeed, no one expected the Bruins to embark on such a record-breaking peace, not even the most optimistic prognosticators.

The Bruins exceeded expectations from Day 1. They thrived when McAvoy, Marchand and Grzelcyk began the season on the shelf, who all returned ahead of schedule from their respective off-season surgeries.

“It’s been pretty electric to be honest,” DeBrusk told the TNT studio crew. “It’s been crazy. You know, it’s one of those things where there were a lot of question marks going on with our team at the beginning of the season…a lot of naysayers, and we had some big injuries obviously. But, we just tried to grow as a group and tried to get those guys on board going full swing.”

DeBrusk, himself, missed several weeks with upper and lower-body ailments that he sustained during his triumphant Winter Classic performance. But the Bruins continued to thrive without DeBrusk, who returned to the lineup in mid-February.

The final weeks of the regular season presented a luxurious situation for Boston’s coaching staff. The load management phase of the schedule continued on Sunday, with Krejci, McAvoy and Bergeron scratched from the lineup.

Without their reliable trio, the lineup depth paced Boston to its 60th win. And now they sit three wins and eight points away from surpassing the respective NHL records.

“It’s an honor to be a part of the Spoked B,” Montgomery told TNT. “And everyone is proud of what we achieved.”