In Boston, David Pastrnak scored a double on Monday afternoon to lead the Bruins to a 3-1 win over the visiting Ottawa Senators.
“When [Pastrnak’s] really on like he was tonight, it jumps out at you,” Bruins coach Jim Montgomery said. “When he has his B-game, it still jumps out at you. That’s how good he is, and he was just ultracreative. I thought him and Charlie McAvoy were special tonight.”
Jake DeBrusk gave the Bruins a 1-0 lead in the first period at 15:09.
“It’s obviously always a good time when you see the puck go in the net,” DeBrusk said. “To get us up in the first there, to get the first goal of the game, it’s always [nice getting] the crowd involved, and that’s what I wanted to do.”
Linus Ullmark made 30 saves in the Bruins win.
Boston moved to 43-8-5.
The loss dampened some of the heat being generated by Ottawa in the Eastern Conference.
The Senators dropped to 27-25-4, they are 7-2-1 in their last ten games.
“You’re never going to be satisfied, obviously, with a loss,” Ottawa defenseman Travis Hamonic said. “A tough back-to-back (after a 7-2 win against the St. Louis Blues on Sunday), really difficult building to come into historically no matter where that team is in the standings. They’re the No. 1 team in the League, so we feel like we played them really strong, obviously, all season, and it was a good game for us this afternoon, and just a couple chances end up going [in] the back of our net.”
Charlie McAvoy assisted on all three Bruins goals.
“We would love to have that back in a tight game like this,” Ottawa coach D.J. Smith said. “But you can’t let it affect the rest of the game, which I didn’t think it did. I thought we played hard. That’s a really good team. We had our chances, I thought we checked really hard. [Mandolese] was really good. It’s just at the end of the day, a couple mistakes we made, you know, ended up in our net.”
Claude Giroux was the lone striker for the Senators, his fist period goal tied the game, 1-1.
Pastrnak scored in the second period to give the Bruins a 2-1 lead at 17:06.
Boston got a little breathing room when Pastrnak hit for his double at 12:10 of the third frame.
“It was a set play,” Pastrnak said. “[McAvoy and I] didn’t connect the tape-to-tape. He just let it bounce off the boards, and I told him right away, ‘That’s an unbelievable play.’ Heads down to him, great pass.”
Kevin Mandolese made 29 saves in the Ottawa loss.
“Just trying to work to get that puck back,” Senators forward Dylan Gambrell said. “A couple of guys changing, and staying out there [for] the extra second just to keep them in their zone, but you know, it was a great finish.”
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