Peverley/By S. Bradley
WILMINGTON, Mass. — The Bruins have scored one power play goal in each of their last six games, and have moved back into the top half of the league’s man-advantage rankings as of this morning to 13th with a success rate of 18.1 percent.
But that doesn’t mean head coach Claude Julien and his staff are done tinkering with the personnel.
Last Friday’s trades with Atlanta and Toronto gave Julien some new players to work in, and today the club spent some time during practice at Ristuccia Arena ironing out its five-man units.
Gone from the power play were Gregory Campbell and Brad Marchand, who had been adding a gritty element to one of the groups. Instead, one unit featured Dennis Seidenberg and Steven Kampfer at the points with David Krejci and Milan Lucic up front and a rotation of Michael Ryder and Nathan Horton joining them at forward.
The other group featured Zdeno Chara and Andrew Ference (filling in for the absent Tomas Kaberle) on the blue line with Patrice Bergeron, Mark Recchi and newcomer Rich Peverley as the forwards. Peverley mostly worked the left half-wall.
“He’s got a pretty good shot. He’s got the quick release. And just watching him this morning on the power play, he seems to be moving the puck well and making good decisions,” said Julien about the former Thrashers’ potential contribution to the man-advantage. “We’ll get a better idea in those games coming up, but that’s what you get from him. I think we like the way he’s got that quick release.”
Twelve of Peverley’s 34 points and six of his 14 goals this season have come on the power play.
“In Atlanta, we kind of didn’t have set positions,” he said after his second practice with the Bruins. ‘I played with [Andrew] Ladd and [Nik] Antropov and we were kind of all over the place. Antropov preferred being in front of the net. It was kind of a rover thing, and sometimes I’d end up on the half wall over there. We had some pretty good defensemen in [Dustin] Byfuglien and [Tobias] Enstrom. So it looks like it’s going to be the same thing here with some great defensemen.”
Peverley said the overall approach of the Boston power play is similar to what the team was trying to do in Atlanta.
“I think it’s pretty similar. A lot of power play concepts are just getting the puck back to the D men, especially when you’ve got Chara back there to shoot the puck and get to the net,” he said. “I think it’s probably no different here either.”
It might be a risk for Julien to mess with success, but Peverley comes over from the eighth-ranked power play in the league. He might be able to get Boston’s man-advantage to the next level now that it’s back among the top 15.
Another huge point to consider. How improved it looked and without even a practice under his belt. Dude only met the team about 20 mins before the pre-game skate….
Yeah, Kaberle brings a huge amount of intangibles we aren’t used to seeing here. I was debating with a few fans who were less than impressed with the PP during his first game. I pointed out how much time we spent in the offensive end (as stated above by David), how easily we gained access to that end and on the one PP goal we did get, how much Kaberle being there opens up the lanes for everyone. The PK’s in the league have to respect him, which makes space for everyone else. We didn’t have that influence before. Teams would just press the puck and try to keep Chara from teeing up. They can’t do that anymore.
kaberle must mean velcro in czech. hard to get the puck past the blueline when he’s at point.
If you watched replays of the Ottawa game, you would see how much more time we spent in the opposing end as compared to any point this season. In those replays, notice how much you see #12. That’s why
because chara needs a guy, who has the vision, the anticipation and the pass to find chara, like wideman and savard did two years ago
If the Dpairs during 5-on-5 are Kaberle-Seidenberg and we’ve seen Chara and Kampfer work well together.. why mix them up on the PP? Seems to make better sense to let these guys who play together on 5-5, do the same on the PP. Mix the forwards how you like, but why not keep the pairings in the back end together to remain more cohesive?
Peverley is a nice addition by PC -with the infusion of Kaberle and Peverley the Bruins should see some dividends by the playoffs on the PP
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