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Wind sprints have a way of getting hockey players” attention, don’t they?
A day after Bruins coach Jim Montgomery decided to end practice by treating his players to an eye-opening bag skate, the B’s responded with their most lopsided win of the season, pummeling the Buffalo Sabres, 5-2, at KeyBank Center on Tuesday.
Against a young, talented Sabres team that just can’t seem to turn the corner from mediocrity, a total 10 Bruins got on the scoresheet and three B’s got their first goals of the season as the B’s put their uneven performance in Montreal last Saturday in the rearview mirror.
For the first time this year, the outcome was never in doubt.
The B’s exploded for three goals in the first period, including two in a span of 1:08 in the first five minutes.
Danton Heinen opened the scoring at 3:01 with his first of the year. Matt Poitras won the puck behind the net and dished it up to Mason Lohrei before coming up to take it back from his fellow rookie and feed Charlie McAvoy. The defenseman fired a shot toward the net that produced a rebound for Heinen, parked at the top of the crease, to flip into the open net vacated by goalie Devon Levi. The Poitras helper snapped a three-game pointless streak for the rookie.
McAvoy then created the second goal with a good rush out of his own zone before dishing to Pavel Zacha on the right wing. Zacha found a wide open David Pastrnak, who ripped a one-timer past a helpless Levi for his 11th of the season.
Looking to jumpstart his team, Rasmus Dahlin delivered a good reverse hit on Brad Marchand, with whom he’s battled over the years. McAvoy waded into the fray and Dylan Cozens ripped David Pastrnak’s helmet off from behind in the ensuing scrum. The upshot of all that was a 4-on-4 and, with open ice situation, the B’s turned potential disaster into a 3-0 lead at 15:14.
The Sabres’ Casey Mittelstadt slipped a puck through Brandon Carlo for what was almost a 2-on-0. But Linus Ullmark dove to push the puck back up to Carlo, who started a 3-on-1. He dished it up to Zacha on the left wing and then Zacha zipped it over to Pastrnak on the right wing. With Levi going post-to-post, Pastrnak fed Carlo in the middle and he scored his first of the year into an empty net.
Despite the score, Ullmark (29 saves) was tested quite a bit in the first period, forcing him to make 13 saves, several of them of the high danger variety.
But early in the second period, the B’s stretched it to a 4-0 lead on Oskar Steen’s first of the year. Jakub Lauko made a nifty kick pass to John Beecher at the Buffalo blue line and he chased it into the corner. After Owen Power won a puck battle in the corner, the young defenseman handed it right to Steen in the left circle. Steen, who had a goal called back in Montreal for goaltender interference, left no doubt this time, sniping a wrist shot in the far corner behind the former Northeastern netminder at 4:07.
It was first goal night for the B’s, and the next one went to a player the B’s need to get going offensively. With time winding down on the B’s first power play, Hampus Lindholm took a slapper from the blue line that deflected out front and got past Levi to make it 5-0 at 12:23. Levi would soon be pulled for Ukko-Pekka Luukonen.
The Sabres finally got one back late when Victor Olofsson scored off a rebound off the end boards at 15:07, but they were still in a deep hole.
Olofsson scored another one with 4:58 left in regulation, but that was all they could muster.
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