The B’s have clearly established their dwelling ice bona fides. Even their one blemish on the 14-0-1 document was a testomony to how tough it’s to beat them on Garden ice after they worn out a 3-0 deficit in opposition to the Vegas Golden Knights on Monday evening.
Now it’s time to make their mark on the highway. Yes, their 6-3 document away from Causeway Street is sweet, however a few of their top-tier NHL competitors have been nice on the highway. The New Jersey Devils, the workforce in sizzling pursuit of the B’s for Eastern Conference supremacy, is an incredible 11-1 away from Newark, whereas the best-in-the-West Golden Knights are a formidable 12-2-1 after their shootout win right here.
The B’s will look to enhance their highway fortunes on what is predicted to be a tricky three-game highway journey in opposition to Colorado on Wednesday, Arizona on Friday (the Coyotes have confirmed to be a more durable than anticipated) and a rematch in opposition to Bruce Cassidy’s Golden Knights in Vegas on Sunday.
Maybe it’s an excessive amount of to ask, however it could be good if they may set up the identical form of id on the highway as at dwelling.
“I’m excited for this trip to try and do something like that. It’s always fun to get on the road. It’s a good excuse to go get some dinner and stuff like that. It would be nice to spend some quality time with the guys,” stated Charlie McAvoy, who has solely performed three highway video games since getting back from offseason shoulder surgical procedure. “But, yeah, I think that’s the collective goal on this trip, to establish a road identity. I think as the season goes you grow so maybe we’re in a better spot than we were when when we went on a couple of other road trips.”
Winning on the highway has not been a lot of a difficulty for the B’s lately. Last season, that they had practically similar dwelling and away information (26-13-2, 25-13-3) and, within the pre-pandemic season of 2019-20, they weren’t all that a lot totally different on highway than at dwelling (22-4-9, 22-10-3).
“I think it’s just going out and playing hockey and not overthinking anything, just stick to our game and just knowing it doesn’t matter really about the crowd and what they do. It’s about what we do,” stated McAvoy. “It’s a different sort of mentality on the road. It’s sort of you versus everybody, not individually but as a team. It’s the team versus everybody, so it’s kind of fun. It’s fun to be a spoiler.”
While the B’s have suffered all three of their losses – and, OK, it’s a quibble – have come away from dwelling, coach Jim Montgomery has no issues.
“ We have a veteran team that knows how to play on the road,” stated Montgomery. “We haven’t scored as much on the road as we have at home, but that’s probably normal. But I think that we’ve had a couple back-to-backs on the road that we’ve managed and then went into Buffalo. I think our game doesn’t change and that’s what I like, that our identity is the same where we check hard and try to make plays.”
Charlie bustle?
McAvoy won’t get the warmest reception at Ball Arena on Wednesday. In the primary interval of the B’s win over the Avalanche on Saturday, Artturi Lehkonen was jamming away at Linus Ullmark on the whistle when McAvoy took it upon himself to wrap up Lehkonen and slam him to the ice.
A little bit tough? Yes. Could it have been a two-minute penalty? Also, sure, although each gamers may have gone. But Avs followers on social media consider it was extra nefarious than that – Lehkonen is now a part of a rising group of Avalanche wounded – and, when requested by a Colorado reporter if he thought the play was “dirty” on Monday, Avalanche coach Jared Bednar stated, “Yes.”
McAvoy was solely vaguely conscious of any controversy.
“I saw some things. I had a couple of people commenting on my Instagram stuff, saying some inappropriate things about that. But I didn’t even know what it was about,” stated McAvoy. “(Lehkonen) was like on top of Linus. I’m not trying to do anything bad. I hope that’s not the play that he got hurt on. It’s never my intent to injure anybody because I know he left the game hurt. But, no, I was just trying to protect our goalie. I didn’t think anything of it, to be honest.”
Bednar undoubtedly has had it with accidents. In Monday’s loss in Philadelphia, star Nathan MacKinnon suffered an higher physique damage and is predicted to overlook a while, becoming a member of an extended checklist of high gamers on the shelf.
Middle floor
When Montgomery took over, one of many wrinkles he put in was to make use of the center of the ice extra on the breakouts. Teams are noticing. Vegas’ Jonathan Marchessault picked off a David Pastrnak go and scored on a rebound of his personal breakaway shot within the first interval.
Montgomery gave a tip of the cap to Cassidy and his employees.
“Vegas did a good job. They pre-scouted us well,” stated Montgomery. “But we gave up a goal in Tampa on the same thing. We have to look before we go to the middle of the ice and teams are sitting on that now. They’re clogging up the middle. That’s something we recognize and we’re not doing a good enough job of taking the ice that’s available. We’ve talked about it and actually showed more video on it today, because it’s not just Vegas that did it. Tampa did it both games and Colorado plays that way, too. You take that away, and there are other ways to create offense. And that’s what we’re looking at now.”
Dual confidence
Montgomery made the mildly stunning choice to go along with Jeremy Swayman in opposition to the Golden Knights as an alternative of Vezina Trophy candidate Ullmark. He wished Swayman to construct off his earlier sturdy outing in opposition to Tampa final week.
“And also, we said right from the start that we have confidence in both goalies,” stated Montgomery. “Clearly, Linus has had a great year. But with our schedule, (goalie coach Bob Essensa) maps it out and we discuss it and we’re going every two days and there’s going to be a lot of travel now. We don’t want to wear anyone out.”
Source: www.bostonherald.com
