Boston Bruins: Everyone Pitches in for Another Win over the Toronto Maple Leafs

The Boston Bruins flexed their depth and their abundant energy to a nearly maximum extent on Saturday.

With the exception of goaltender Tim Thomas, who savored a rare night off, and forward Benoit Pouliot, every man in uniform had at least a pair of beneficial items on the stats sheet.

Whether it was in the way of points, shots on goal, blocked shots, saves, body-checks, takeaways or face-off victories, everybody found something they liked en route to a 4-1 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Perhaps the most telling stat (even if slightly under-the-radar) was Patrice Bergeron wresting away 19 out of 23 draws. By taking a little less than one-third of all the night’s 62 total face-offs and winning such a vast majority, he was all but the sole reason Boston overwhelmed Toronto, 42-20, in the draw department.

In turn, although there is not much data to formally verify it, the Bruins indulged in a comfortable amount of possession time, particularly in the third period.

It didn’t help Toronto’s cause that in the most desperate phases of the game with a 3-1 deficit and less than 15 minutes to go, the visitors yielded the night’s final three giveaways while Boston’s Tyler Seguin was credited with the last takeaway.

For what it’s worth, the Bruins charged up a game total of 55 attempted shots as opposed to 42 by the Leafs. And despite giving Toronto four more minutes of power-play time (6:22 versus 2:22 for themselves), the Bruins confined the Leafs to three special teams’ shots on net. Boston matched that total at the other end with two power-play bids and one shorthanded stab.

That shorthanded try came off the stick of Daniel Paille with 12:41 to spare in the third period while captain Zdeno Chara was serving his second two-minute sentence of the night.

Chara was one of only three Boston skaters not to pelt Maple Leafs’ goaltender James Reimer, yet he and first-unit partner Johnny Boychuk managed a team-high plus-three rating on the night. He tied Milan Lucic for another team-high with four hits.

And despite the fact that their towering captain and invaluable penalty killer was unavailable for two of their four shorthanded segments, the Bruins offered nothing to Toronto, whose power play remains the second-most prolific in the league with a 22.4 percent conversion rate.

Apparently, surmounting that particular hurdle made the sprint to the finish something much closer to a breeze. Starting with Paille’s shorthanded hack, the Bruins went on an 8-2 run in the shooting gallery to wind things down, including the game’s last four shots within the last half of the frame.

Goaltender Tuukka Rask had already answered what would be his final test 76 seconds before Nathan Horton scored with 5:34 remaining, giving himself and linemates David Krejci and Lucic each a two-point outing.

After Rask denied Clarke MacArthur with 6:50 to go, the Leafs did not so much as attempt another shot for more than five minutes. Ultimately, Phil Kessel shanked one wide, Chris Kelly got in the way of a Luke Schenn slapper and Boychuk blocked Tim Connolly’s last try as the clock expired.

That polished off another winning cause, but the way the Bruins officially set themselves on another triumphant course in the thick of the second period was another testament to supreme energy and poise. Ironically enough, the play started with an ostensibly shagged-out set of legs.

At the 12:15 mark of the middle frame, Bergeron, Seguin and Brad Marchand along with the starting defensive pair of Boychuk and Chara were forced to extend their shift after an icing call.

Picking up the remnants of a quick Connolly shot off the ensuing draw, the relatively youthful line bolted the other way on an odd-man rush to set up a stimulating threat that they likely would have polished off if not for the previous icing.

Instead, they just continued to press long enough to get off and let Chris Kelly’s line to take over on the fly. The next stoppage was none other than Kelly’s go-ahead strike, a one-time snapper off a cross-ice feed from Peverley that eluded Reimer’s right boot.

With a renewed one-goal deficit glowering at them, the Leafs did manage five of the middle frame’s last seven shots. But on their final burst of energy, they could not rerun the same rapid responsiveness that had Mikael Grabovski drawing a 1-1 knot 48 seconds after Krejci broke the ice earlier in the period.

On the other side of the Zamboni shift, they would be outclassed in the shots category, 11-4, with Boychuk and Horton injecting the insurance doses for Boston.