Sunday was enjoyable day for the Bruins at Fenway Park forward of Monday’s Winter Classic.
After a breezy follow on the out of doors sheet, Jim Montgomery raced speedster Jake DeBrusk (the coach was granted a head begin and claimed victory). Patrice Bergeron raced his youngsters and completed with a stomach flop. And some members of the family had some kinks to work out.
“I just told my Mom, ‘I give you tons of credit’ because she raised a hell of a hockey player but she can’t even skate. I was surprised at that. I haven’t seen her on the ice for a while,” stated David Pastrnak with amusing.
But on Monday afternoon, there will likely be an actual hockey recreation performed and it counts, possibly even a bit greater than two factors. The slumping Pittsburgh Penguins (4 straight losses, 0-2-2) are combating for his or her lives within the ultra-competitive Metropolitan Division and the B’s, although this recreation received’t be performed on the Garden, nonetheless have a zero within the regulation loss column on their house document (18-0-3).
And with all of the pomp and pageantry that goes together with the Winter Classic (this would be the B’s fourth, and fifth out of doors recreation), no competitor takes the sport calmly.
“To me, having been fortunate of being part of it last year (as an assistant coach with St. Louis), this is the Super Bowl of the NHL in the regular season,” stated Montgomery. “We all know the Stanley Cup is the be-all, end-all for the NHL. But it’s a magnificent moment. I remember last year (at Target Field in Minnesota) at one point ‘Livin’ on a Prayer’ was going through the stadium and I was like ‘Ah, this is what it’s like to be Jon Bon Jovi.’ So it’s a special moment for us and a special game and in no way is just another regular season game.”
There is one thing else from which the B’s may benefit. At 28-4-4, the B’s are comfortably in a playoff spot. Maybe too comfortably. It can’t harm them to have the stress turned up a bit bit.
“We’ve talked a lot about playing in the moment, next shift, control what we can control and being very process-oriented,” stated Montgomery. “This can mimic a playoff or maybe going down the stretch and having to win a game to win first place. This allows us to prepare mentally for what we hope lays ahead for us.”
With the Winter Classic, ice circumstances are at all times a part of the equation. But regardless of plenty of rain in a single day, the floor received usually good evaluations on Sunday.
“It was good. It was smooth. There were a couple of bouncing pucks, which was normal, but I honestly liked the ice. I thought it was fast. It’s tougher to get used to the environment more than the ice,” stated Jake DeBrusk. “It’s just a completely different feeling. Instead of seeing people on top of the ice, there’s a space in between. You just feel like you’re spaced differently. It’s interesting when you’re there. You feel so small.”
Brad Marchand had a barely harsher critique.
“I would say it was to be as expected,” stated Marchand. “I don’t think you can ever expect to have great ice in these games unless you’re playing in like Edmonton or some place like that. But they have ice, and we’re going to be able to play, that’s the main thing. We’re excited that it’s looking like it’s going to be good enough to play.”
Marchand stated there’s solely a lot you’ll be able to attempt as soon as the puck is dropped.
“You just have to keep it simple,” stated Marchand. “Keep pucks away from the top of the blue line, keep it in deep as much as you can and try to play straightforward hockey. The more passes you try to make, there’s a good chance it’s going to blow up on you at some time. Just have that shot mentality and keep pucks away from the blue line. That should help.”
The climate is predicted to be type to these attending the sport – sunny and round 50 levels – nevertheless it poses a problem for the NHL people charged with protecting the ice in good situation. The league has had tougher climes – Nashville, Dallas (rain) and, most notably, very sunny Lake Tahoe – however it’s one thing to control.
Much of the taking part in floor needs to be underneath shadow by the scheduled puck drop shortly after 2 p.m., however the rink ought to see loads of solar within the morning and early afternoon.
Could that create a delay?
“Right now our plan is to get through practices here today, we’ll cover the sheet tonight and we’ll watch the weather (Monday). We’ll keep it covered right up until the very last minute. We have that plan in place to uncover really close to warmup. We’ll see what Mother Nature has for us (Monday),” stated Derek King, the league’s Director of Facilities and Hockey Operations. …
WEEI’s Rich Keefe tweeted on New Year’s Eve that David Pastrnak and the Bruins have been finalizing a deal for UFA-to-be David Pastrnak on an eight-year, $88 million contract extension. While that quantity falls consistent with plenty of hypothesis, Pastrnak’s agent J.P. Barry responded that it isn’t so.
“We are talking, too hard to say whether progress (has been made) or not, but lots of dialogue from both sides. Radio report was rubbish,” wrote Barry in an e-mail to the Herald. …
Brandon Carlo was sporting a fairly colourful black eye and minimize simply outdoors the left eye that wanted a few stitches, due to a excessive stick from Buffalo’s JJ Peterka late within the B’s 4-3 additional time loss on Saturday. Carlo feels very lucky.
“It definitely made some contact with my eye because my eye just went gray for seven or eight minutes. I couldn’t see,” stated Carlo. “I didn’t know if it was coming back for a minute there just because panic was setting in. But after that, I could see the a little bit of the outline of the doctor and then about 10 minutes later I know I’d fully be able to see again. But it took a while for this floaters to leave.” …
While it was no shock, Montgomery stated that Linus Ullmark will certainly get the beginning on Monday.
Source: www.bostonherald.com