The Best Highlight for the Boston Bruins' Stars in 2014-15

The Boston Bruins are one game away from reaching the midway point of the 2014-15 regular season. Beyond belief, despite a substandard 19-15-6 start, they have sprinkled a smattering of bright moments on the first three months of their itinerary.

This season will not likely yield any of the same hardware (Presidents' Trophy, Selke, Vezina) for Boston as 2013-14 did. But the team’s top specimens of talent have each issued a few reminders that no lengthy campaign is an all-or-nothing journey.

Amidst the Bruins’ collective underachievement, their top two setup men at center have each flexed their playmaking prowess at times. Their leading goal scorer, such as he is, has polished off some sequences in a momentous manner.

At the other end, their top goaltender has made just enough head-turning moves to make everyone wonder why he is not doing so more often. Meanwhile, his most well-rounded praetorian guards have offered a few promising glimpses of the past and present bridging the future.

Based on a combination of implications and visual appeal, here are the top plays of this season’s first half from Boston’s six most celestial players.

Unless otherwise indicated, all statistics for this report were found via NHL.com

Patrice Bergeron

Ordinarily, drawing an opposing penalty is a combination of a consolation prize and deferred potential gratification when one falls short of successfully completing a scoring threat.

The 13th minute of the third period of a Nov. 6 game, however, was an extraordinary sequence in which Patrice Bergeron maxed out the gains.

With the Bruins on a power play against Edmonton, the two-way connoisseur maneuvered through neutral ice and around Oilers defenseman Nikita Nikitin.

Nikitin resorted to a trip over the near faceoff dot, incurring a delayed minor. But first, the persistent Bergeron delivered a centering feed to Carl Soderberg, who converted from the slot.

That tally bailed Edmonton’s Keith Aulie from his own two-minute sentence 29 seconds early, thereby barring Nikitin from ordinary absolution. In turn, Boston’s primal playmaker garnered credit for a rare two-in-one package of an assist and a drawn power play on the same move.

Zdeno Chara

Having missed 19 of the first 40 games due to injury, aging Bruins captain Zdeno Chara has a more limited selection of highlights than his teammates so far.

In mid-October, however, he did polish one of the few bright spots in a fall-from-ahead, 6-4 falter against Montreal. Stationed on Carey Price’s porch for a power play, the towering Slovak combined his peerless sight-blocking with surprising timing and dexterity.

For more than half a minute, Chara gave the penalty-killing quartet an extra problem in the depths of the zone while his teammates buzzed almost everywhere above the hash marks. Finally, straightaway point patroller David Krejci unleashed a low-flying slapper, which Chara directed to the left of Price.

Dougie Hamilton

Chara’s understudy, Dougie Hamilton, is presently tied for fifth among the Bruins with 23 points and third with 16 assists. But in terms of sheer showcasing, his top play of 2014-15 is a single-handed, multizone rush that put away an Oct. 25 tilt with Toronto.

With Boston safeguarding a 3-0 advantage in the fifth minute of the closing frame, Hamilton hovered in open ice while others scrummed along the near wall on Bruins property. When the puck squirted loose, he activated his turbine jets and crossed all three lines into Leafs territory.

Using a greater-than-average burst of speed while keeping a grip on the biscuit, Hamilton dodged backcheckers Jake Gardiner and Stephane Robidas. With a sprawling Robidas on his heels in the slot, he scorched goaltender Jonathan Bernier from the high slot.

If the 21-year-old Hamilton has more of that in him, Boston can bank on a foundation for a sound transition game.

David Krejci

Like Hamilton, Krejci tends to be on the giving end when he joins in on a scoring play. Feats like this feed through a forest of Minnesota skaters to eventual scorer Seth Griffith barely missed the cut for this slide.

But the victor here is another homeward-bound hustle in Boston’s 4-1 win over the Maple Leafs back on Oct. 25. Instead of letting the puck pierce through the opposing fortress, Krejci worked around it himself to finish his own play.

As NESN play-by-play announcer Jack Edwards aptly noted in the embedded clip, the right-handed center executed a swooping approach to the cage “on an off-wing rush” from the near boards at the Toronto blue line.

Furthermore, not unlike Hamilton one period later, Krejci kept clean possession despite being shadowed by an opponent. In this case, Phil Kessel caught up at the near dot and extended his twig, only to see Krejci beat him to Bernier.

At that point, Boston’s top pivot took successive stabs before tucking in the tally for a 2-0 edge.

Brad Marchand

Boston’s goal-scoring leader (11) had his own moment crossing into the attacking zone and befuddling the backcheckers en route to a connection.

In a Nov. 4 overtime with Florida, the Bruins regrouped in neutral ice after a giveaway botched a potential Panthers counter-rush. Winger Brad Marchand ensured that, upon absorbing the loose puck, Hamilton only needed to nudge it to him along the center line.

Once he had possession, Marchand swung the sequence back across the Bruins emblem and onto Panthers property. Cutting up the middle lane, he dealt himself a miniature self-pass past the stick of defenseman Dylan Olsen, whom he subsequently blew by.

Recollecting the biscuit on his backhand, he nimbly snapped the sudden-death strike over goaltender Roberto Luongo’s right shoulder. That gave Marchand his second overtime goal in less than a week and his second of what are now a team-high three clinchers this season.

Tuukka Rask

Twice in as many months now, the Bruins have blown a 2-1 lead en route to a 3-2 matinee overtime or shootout loss to Ottawa. In between, they have brooked several similar letdowns, variously cultivating one point or zero.

As much as that habit can impel New England puckheads to shred a few follicles, it could be worse. Boston could have more than just two regulation losses in its last 11 games dating back to their Dec. 13 slide against the Senators.

Tuukka Rask’s biggest individual save of the season so far was one of the reasons why they mustered a regulation tie that afternoon. The Bruins were still clutching that 2-1 advantage with less than five minutes left in the second period when Ottawa pounced on a defensive gaffe.

With a vacant slab of the net at his disposal, Sens forward Colin Greening absorbed a crisp feed from Mark Stone. But the attentive Rask used his precious split-seconds to close that opening with his right boot.

None other than Stone would later set up an equalizer by David Legwand early in the third. But Rask’s rod-hockey-esque turn on Greening prolonged the preceding gap and may have made a critical difference between a regulation and shootout defeat for Boston.