Kampfer should be scratched/By S. Bradley

Now we know which Bruins defenseman should go to the press box if Andrew Ference is indeed ready to return from injury Saturday night in Toronto.

Rookie Steven Kampfer made his pitch to be plucked out of the lineup by taking an ill-advised holding penalty on Mike Fisher in overtime prior to Shea Weber’s game-winning man-advantage goal that clinched a 4-3 win for Nashville tonight.

It was just Kampfer’s 20th shift of the game, as he skated for just 14:33 on the night — least among the Bruins’ six defensemen. Fisher was in the corner with his back to the goal and wasn’t in position to be a threat when Kampfer bear hugged the veteran center in the corner of the Boston zone. Kampfer was playing his second game since returning from a concussion.

Ference, out since Feb. 26 with a lower-body injury, should be ready to go against the Maple Leafs. He’ll be a welcome addition to the lineup.

Here’s a glance at the rest of the box score and a little analysis of this evening’s action:

•Tuukka Rask, making his second straight start, was sharp again with 27 saves and just one goal that you might call a bad one (the first Nashville goal he was out of position on). The Predators even needed a third shot after two brilliant saves to tie the game with 9:04 left. Rask stopped Martin Erat’s breakaway attempt and then Sergei Kostitsyn’s follow shot. But Legwand buried the goal with the Bruins forwards in the midst of a change and/or stopping off for a St. Patrick’s Day beverage instead of backchecking.

•It was an up-and-down night for Boston’s healthy-scratch brothers Tyler Seguin and Michael Ryder.

Seguin, playing his second straight game after two consecutive scratches, scored his 11th goal of the season just 1:50 in. If the goal gave him any sort of burst of confidence, he didn’t utilize it. The goal was his only shot on net all night. And the only other play he was really involved in was the elbow he took to his face from Patric Hornqvist, who got a major penalty and a game misconduct.

Ryder was clearly more active after his first healthy scratch in his nearly three seasons with the Bruins. Skating in Brad Marchand’s spot with Patrice Bergeron and Mark Recchi, Ryder fired seven shots on net and registered an assist. But his inability to solve Pekka Rinne on a second-period breakaway — after he got out of the penalty box — put a damper on his evening. While Rinne was just as solid as Rask with 35 saves, even an AHL goaltender can stop a breakaway when the shooter just snaps it on net without making any sort of a move. With Ryder, some things never change.

•The Bruins’ power play, which even featured Seguin for 1:25 of ice time, was 0-for-3. Boston even squandered the entirety of that five-minute major. To be fair, Horton hit the post during that power play, but he had about 2 feet of net to shoot at with Rinne caught out of position. If there was a positive to take, there was more traffic in front of Rinne even if there weren’t many rebounds to dig for. Against a lesser netminder, the Bruins probably would’ve had more in-tight chances to score.

Published By Thu. March 17, 2011 11:19 pm EDT