Pouliot sick, Bruins hope first-line reunion will cure them
BOSTON — The Bruins practiced today at TD Garden without the services of Benoit Pouliot.
Head coach Claude Julien said the forward was sick and he did not know if Pouliot would make the trip to Montreal for tomorrow night’s game against the Canadiens.
The rest of the Bruins forwards lined up in some familiar combinations that Julien has decided to go back to. Milan Lucic and Nathan Horton were back on David Krejci’s wings, while Rich Peverley was back on Chris Kelly’s wing (with Jordan Caron on the left side). Tyler Seguin joined Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand. Only the fourth line remained untouched.
All seven defensemen and the two goaltenders practiced for the last-in-the-East Bruins. The session lasted 40, pretty intense, minutes. For more on today’s practice, read my NHL.com article.
Karl Hungus
I think Boychuk’s play on defence has been pretty good, I don’t think you want to change that. If your going to make moves these are the ones I’d like to see; recall Sauve and move Pouliot to Providence, Corvo plays less on the power play, play Caron more, and put Bergeron on the PP point.
The worst thing would be to trade Lucic as some have advocated. He may need to be benched a period, on occassion, but I think his contributions far outweigh his shortcomings.
Enough with the Pouliot experiment…he’s a BUST. He’s taken ice time from Caron, hindering his NHL development.
Frank has the beat. Pouliot is not in a state of mind to bear with Montreal’s crowd. Good move by CJ. Actually, finding a way for Pouliot to gain confidence while being coherent managing ice time, winning games, coping with a slow start is CJ’s toughest assignment.
All the best!
good for segzy. pev has sucked since he signed the contract extension.
i wouldn’t mind seeing boychuck moved up to rw. couldn’t get any worse. the forwards make every opposing goalie look like a vezina candidate.
I originally opposed signing Clark but I’m sure he’d be as productive as Pouliot by now, with the added leadership and grit. Low cost move that would help. And there’s no way Pouliot lasts the season.
BTW, I don’t think Seguin has ever been on a line with Bergeron and Marchand for an entire game and it is a combination many here have wanted to see. If they are together tonight I expect some pretty good chances.
I understand the position Chiarelli was in during the summer, almost all UFA’s were drastically overpaid. He opted for a very low risk Pouliot signing as depth for a largely intact Cup winning roster, and instead of Clark they wanted a spot open for a younger player like Caron to get some time in. But right now I think something should be done by Chiarelli if possible because they have the cap space to add someone substantially better than Pouliot to the roster.
Yuckster, that’s funny. I was thinking about Clark today. I don’t know if it was a $ decision, (already having it paid to Benoit) or they thought they saw something in camp, but Clark would have atleast brought character/grit. AND he’s a regional kid too boot! Nobody, including I, was saying it at the time, but he’d be nice to have right now, imo.
Cormac, that’s just an awful stat!
Lets hope he gets going, it’s still early, but history is what it is & Jack Edwards is looking like a smarter hockey mind then Chia Pete right now. Atleast in regards to this deal.
Disclaimer: I didn’t have a problem with this deal when it was made, it’s short $ & short term, but dude’s been like clingwrap so far. Invisible & next to useless on ice =D
Yeah hello, is this Chris Clark? Hey, it’s Peter. Look we made a bad decision not signing you. Please come back. Um, don’t worry about competition from that Pouliot character, we sent him to Providence.
The bruins need consistency and so do their lines. Keep the Hulk line together to see if they can ‘click’ but give Seguin line the majority of playing time. By far he has been everything and more this year offensively and while his defense is lacking, having Bergeron to back him up for his freedom could pay dividends.
Pouliot is sick the way John Lackey needs Tommy John surgery.
Pouliot’s not the answer. We knew this before he arrived, we still know this now. Likes to float and randomly wave his stick around, plays small, doesn’t like to engage physically. I’m sure PC is starting to look around for another forward – hopefully Caron impresses tomorrow night.
Love the proposed line changes, this is what pretty much everyone was screaming for. Long term, I’d like to see Seguin centering a line with Lucic (Milan just creates so much space, and Seguin’s speed can really exploit it), but for now, throwing him on Bergy’s wing makes the most sense. It wouldn’t surprise me if that turns out to be our most productive line.
I love Pevs, but he’s reminding me more and more of Sturmy. Great character, versatile, tons of speed… just not quite enough finish for those top two lines (on a cup contender). He’s got great chemistry with Kelly, it just makes sense to put them together.
Dustin, yeah these lines are a solid idea. I really hope to see that second line in particular, which I think would be a handful for other teams.
PCL,
Bob Beers, B’s color commentator for 98.5 the sports hub mentioned, last night, that Pouliot has 1 goal in his last 32 combined hab/B’s games….last night made it 33 games.
If CJ tweaked the lines to fit PC’s acquisition of Pouliot ‘in’…it hasn’t worked, to put it mildly.
Pouliot was terribly awful last night. I bet he’s not even sick & the Bruins prefer to say so not to lose face & officially have to say he’s a healthy scratch in his 1st game back in Montreal…
Looks like my suggestion for the line-up from the previous article came true. I should be a coach.
He “played” last night. He fit right in.
I forgot that Pouliot was on the team…