In Buffalo, the Boston Bruins continued their seeming relentless push for the playoffs.
On Thursday night, Boston won its sixth straight game, 5-1, over the Sabres.
“Not a lot of poor stretches,” Bruins head coach Bruce Cassidy said. “I think that shows in our goals against. We don’t have these lulls where we have pockets of poor puck management shift after shift. I think we’ve had some no doubt where we haven’t executed well enough.
“Some of that is the skill of the player at times and some of it is us preaching having good awareness of where we are in the game. … The skill part, we’ll keep encouraging the guys to execute well and support the puck well.”
Jeremy Swayman made 29 saves in the win.
“These points are super crucial and we understand that but, again, we’re taking every game as a playoff game,” Swayman said. “I think at this point we’re making sure that we’re doing whatever we can to get two points.”
Arttu Ruotsalainen scored to Sabres only goal.
“Obviously, it’s frustrating, for sure,” Buffalo’s Casey Mittelstadt said. “If we get a power-play goal there with all the penalties in the second, it’s a different game, so, yeah, I think it’s a better mix of we’ve got to do a better job of helping each other if we run into trouble. … Yeah, it’s definitely something that’s frustrating and we’ve got to be better at.”
Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak were among five different strikers for the Bruins.
“[Pastrnak] just didn’t have it (last game) for whatever reason,” Cassidy said. “It was going off his stick. Today he just felt much more comfortable hitting his shot, through the neutral zone, making some plays. Sauce passes that were on the tape. One-on-one moves where the puck’s sticking to him like it used to. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come for him because he’s fought it a little bit lately.”
Matt Grzelcyk anf Nick Ritchie also scored for Boston.
David Krejci scored for Boston, late in the third period to make the 5-1 final.
Dustin Tokarski made 33 saves in the loss.
“I’ll watch the film and go over it and could have a different thought on it,” Sabres head coach Don Granato said. “I thought we played a much more aggressive game (than Tuesday). When I mentioned the shot mentality the other night, we were missing an aggressive attack, puck pressure mentality. We were better in that area tonight. We played better tonight, there’s no question. We played better. We didn’t get any breaks.”
You must be logged in to post a comment.