End of Regular Season and Start of Playoffs

The Bruins had a tough and difficult time at the end of regular season. This had a lot to do with the fact the Bruins couldn't skate all their best players due to league restrictions. Not being able to use our best players we found ourselves in a major slump which meant we had to fight for a playoff spot to the end. At a point during the second half of the season we had our sights set at the #3 spot (which was held by division rivals Montreal Canadiens). But with new GM Ricky Maillee joining the league right after the trade deadline, the Canadiens cruised away and held on to the #3 spot.

The Bruins were able to finish with a three game winning streak with two of the wins versus the New York Islanders and New Jersey Devils, the #6 and #8 seed in the Eastern Conference. With this, the Bruins ended up as the #7 seed, a spot we had at the trade deadline. So even with a tough last quarter or so of the season the Bruins were able to hold their ground and get into the postseason.

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In the first round the Bruins will face #2 seed the Pittsburgh Penguins which we all know will be a difficult task. GM Don Brooks has a very compact team with a league leading defense that impressed with 15 less goals allowed than the second best defensive team in the league. However, the Bruins did have a better offense during the regular season, scoring 29 more goals than the Penguins. This was in large part thanks to the top line of Bergeron-Parise-Nash that carried much of the workload for the Bruins.

A look at some of the offensive numbers for our Bruins reveals that Captain Rick Nash lead the way with 107 points (43+64) good for 7th spot in the scoring race. Zach Parise was 8th in goals and lead the Bruins with 53 (while adding 42 assists for 95 points). Patrice Bergeron was 7th in assists with 70 (and added 22 goals for 92 points). All three categories were won by Sidney Crosby of the Calgary Flames who had a "sick season" where he put up an amazing 179 points (81+98).

We were happy with our secondary scoring from our 2nd line by Shane Doan (27 goals and 41 assists for 68 points), Dominic Moore (20+39 for 59 points) and Justin Williams (20+36 for 56 points) all getting over twenty goals. And rookie Logan Couture had an impressive 18 goals in just 38 games. At defense, Matt Carle, acquired with Parise during the season, lead all defensemen with 8 goals and 25 assists for a respectable 33 points. Andrej Meszaros had 5+19 for 24 points while Rusty Klesla (3+13 for 16 points) and rookie John Carlson (5+10 for 15 points) had solid numbers in limited number of games playing in just 39 and 33 games respectively.