In Raleigh, Antti Raanta made 35 saves on Monday night, and the Carolina Hurricanes downed the Boston Bruins, 5-1, for a Game 1 win.
“For me, it was obviously the first start in the playoffs in the NHL,” Raanta said. “I was just trying to focus on the things that have (allowed me) to be successful. It was working nicely. But it’s only one game, one win, and now it’s just regrouping and getting ready for Wednesday.”
Seth Jarvis and Nino Niederreiter scored in the middle frame to give the Canes a 2-0 lead.
“There was a lot of net-front going on with Jordan,” Niederreiter said. “When he’s the big man in front, nobody sees anything. I was just trying to get the puck to the net and luckily it went in. It was definitely a big goal.”
Taylor Hall scored the Bruins’ lone goal, his strike cut the Canes’ advantage to 2-1. His goal came early in the third period, but failed to spark the Bruins offense.
“‘Rants’ played really well, made some big save,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “Then we got our game going a little bit in the second.”
Teuvo Teravainen replied to the Hall goal to push the Canes lad back to two, at, 3-1.
“Their goalie made saves, and there’s some pucks around the front of the net we just couldn’t locate or take the right path to, but they were there,” Bruins coach Bruce Cassidy said. “[Raanta] is paid to play, too, and he did a good job and he held them in the game early on. … We were ready to play, just couldn’t put anything in the net early on.”
Vincent Trocheck scored for the 4-1 lead to Carolina.
“The Teravainen goal was really big,” Brind’Amour said. “I don’t think we had much action going on, and they were kind of coming. That settled it down a little bit for the rest of the game.”
Andrei Svechnikov hit an empty-net goal for the 5-1 final.
“They do play a really good playoff-style of hockey, and I’m sure that they’re really looking forward to trying to beat the Bruins,” Hall said. “It’s been a couple series now that that hasn’t gone their way, and they play playoff hockey, so it’s going to be a long series no matter what happened tonight.”
Linus Ullmark made 20 saves in the Bruins loss.
“The (fourth) goal wouldn’t have mattered, short side,” Cassidy said. “[Ullmark] is going to tell you it’s not a great goal to give up, but by then it’s 4-1, so we’re not going to put anything on Ullmark. Whatever goalie is in there for us, you got to fight to find pucks in this series.”
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