The final chapters of the 2018-19 Bruins’ season will not be written for at least a few more weeks.
Hoisting the Stanley Cup in June will be the ultimate determinant of Boston’s campaign — but whether it be victory or defeat — there’s no denying Bruce Cassidy’s club has taken quite the road to get to this point.
A year that began with a preseason trek to China has now stretched to nine months — with Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final set to be the 100th game that Boston will take part in so far this season. And while the B’s are primarily focused on winning Games 100, 101, 102 and 103 to put a triumphant stamp on 2018-19, Cassidy and his team set some time aside Sunday to reflect on a long year of hockey.
It can be hard to encapsulate an entire season into one pivotal stretch of games — let alone a single matchup. But before the postseason even got underway, there seemed to be a consensus as to what helped put Boston on track for the playoff push that it is close to capping off with a title.
“Looking back, I’d probably say one of the biggest games for us was the Winter Classic,” Jake DeBrusk told BostonSportsJournal back in April. "That was the first kind of test for the team, all on a big stage. And we won. So any time you can do that, it helps you out. … I think any time you get tested like that, with so many things going on — that’s kind of what the playoffs are all about. The fact that we came out of that on top, I think really helped.”
Boston’s 4-2 victory over the Blackhawks in front of 76,126 fans at Notre Dame Stadium was a promising sign that this Bruins club was more than comfortable performing on the big stage, but even with all of the pomp and circumstance that comes with the annual event on New Year’s Day, it was the momentum generated from the victory that proved to be the club’s main jumping off point.
Boston might have been in the playoff picture entering the new year with a record of 21-14-4, but it failed to pick up much steam in a cutthroat Atlantic Division — with a dramatic OT win over the Sabres on Dec. 29 helping the B’s salvage the month with a record of 7-7-0.
In the days leading up to the Winter Classic, the case could have been made that Jaroslav Halak should start in net over Tuukka Rask, who was 3-4-0 with a .904 save percentage in December.
But after a 36-save performance in South Bend, Rask took off in the second half of the season, posting a .931 save percentage with a pair of shutouts over the next two months. Unsurprisingly, the Bruins followed their netminder’s lead following the Winter Classic, orchestrating a 25-6-5 surge the carried all the way into the final weeks of the regular season.
“The game itself, we seemed to take off from there,” Cassidy said of the Winter Classic Sunday at Warrior Ice Arena. “So that was definitely one area where the group really came together. I think that was the first time, if I'm not mistaken, that we were probably healthy maybe all year with the group we thought we'd start with.”
But even beyond the box score, Cassidy believes that the Winter Classic offered a clear sign of the camaraderie and chemistry that has now become a hallmark of this Bruins team.
Torey Krug’s idea to have the entire team don 1920’s-era suits in homage to the Netflix TV series “Peaky Blinders” on the day of the big game at Notre Dame certainly made for a great photo op, with the Bruins looking more likely to operate a rum-running ring than compete for two points out on the ice.
“A bunch of the guys dressed up as the Peaky Blinders for Halloween,” Brad Marchand said back in January. “It kind of snowballed from there. That night, someone brought it up. I don’t remember who. I was — a couple deep. It just went from there. We all bought in right away.”
Look good, feel good, play good.#WinterClassic☘️ | #NHLBruins pic.twitter.com/haIKA4ghr0
— Boston Bruins (@NHLBruins) January 1, 2019