The Bruins’ system: greater than the solar system.” width=”170″ height=”107″ />
The Bruins' system: greater than the solar system.
MONTREAL — If Boston Bruins head coach Claude Julien were the type to rub his former employers’ noses in his current success, he could take a video of tonight’s third period and ship it off to Lou Lamoriello.
Luckily for Julien, he could save on postage with Bob Gainey because unlike the New Jersey Devils’ czar, the Montreal Canadiens’ general manager/head coach had a front-row seat for the clinic the Bruins put on in playing their coach’s system to perfection to close out a 4-2 win over the Habs in Game 3 of their Eastern Conference quarterfinal series at Bell Centre.
Protecting a 3-2 lead, Boston outshot the Habs just 7-5 — and they wouldn’t have wanted it any other way en route to a 3-0 series lead. The goal was to limit the Habs chances, and you could’ve counted Montreal’s opportunities to tie the game on one finger. The Bruins moved the puck from stick to stick, supported each other, gave each other outlets and, most importantly had each other’s back at the odd times a Habs player got behind the Bruins’ back line.
“We didn’t panic on our breakouts. We didn’t just rim pucks,” Julien said after the game. “They were a lot more aggressive along the boards tonight, but we made some good plays, tape-to-tape passes. We stopped turning pucks over in the neutral zone, started getting pucks in deep, and those little things are so important at this time of year.” (more…)