Bruins play rough, yet disciplined, to put Panthers on the ropes

Linus Ullmark won his race to a goalie goal with Jeremy Swayman back in February.

The new race has seemingly become which goalie can find a fight first. Ullmark nearly got one with Matthew Tkachuk in the Bruins' 6-2 win in Sunday's Game 4 to take a stranglehold of their first-round series with the Florida Panthers, leading 3-1 with a chance to close it out at home on Wednesday.

Battling in a net-front scramble, Tkachuk's stick got up around Ullmark's face and neck before the two traded a couple shots. Brandon Carlo and Derek Forbort grabbed hold of Tkachuk to pull him away as chaos ensued. With Ullmark minding his business, Tkachuk went back at him, and the Bruins netminder lost his top, dropping his glove and blocker before ripping off his mask to have a go at Tkachuk. 

The officials certainly weren't going to let that happen, keeping them apart before handing out a pair of misconducts.

"Everyone stuck up for each other. That's what we do," Tyler Bertuzzi said. "We try to stay out of it between the whistles, but that was one of those things where we stuck up for each other."

Ullmark did not speak to reporters after the game. Charlie McAvoy said, "He's pretty fair-tempered, but I guess everyone has their boiling point. I'll just leave it where it was on the ice."

Ullmark could have remained in the game, but the Bruins felt it best for him to get the gate due to the potential for more extracurriculars before the final horn.

"He could have stayed, but we figured with three minutes left in the game we'd switch the goalies, get Sway a little action, and in case anything else happened, we didn't want to risk anything," Jim Montgomery said. 

He took no issue with his Vezina-favorite netminder standing up for himself, "I love it. He's all in."

Asked back in March which of his goalies he thought might get into fisticuffs, Montgomery assumed incorrectly: "I imagine Swayman might, but my guess is Linus, no."

He said Sunday he never considered that side of Ullmark.

"As a goalie, you're just expected to stop pucks. You're not expected to take stickwork and someone coming after you," he said. "So, we stick together, and we stuck together. Really proud of our group and how they stuck together. [Florida] had six players on the ice because of the pulled-goalie situation."

Tyler Bertuzzi said, "Usually it's Sway doing that, but that was good to see out off [Ullmark]. It's good to show a lot of emotion out there."

Swayman, of course, got some shots in on Jordan Martinook in a win at the Hurricanes on March 26. That was after he skated out to center ice in an attempt to aid Boston in an out-numbered situation involving Jake Allen in a win against Montreal on March 23.

Still, Brad Marchand thought Ullmark (listed at 6-foot-5, 212 pounds) may have been able to handle himself in a potential scrap against the pesky Tkachuk (6-foot-2, 201 pounds).

"I mean, he's got the size and reach, you know, but maybe a little less experience than Tkachuk," Marchand said. "Maybe one day we'll see."

Sunday was the first game in the series that the winning team also led in hits with the B's landing 36 blows to the Cats' 30. Game 3 featured 95 hits between the two sides: 54 for Florida and 41 for Boston. In Game 2, the Bruins had 31 to the Panthers' 29, and Florida had a 44-43 advantage in Game 1.

Not for the faint of heart. 

"It's playoff hockey," Montgomery said. "It's going to get chippy. It's your season on the line. You either win and move on, or you lose and go home. So, it gets really emotional out there, and you saw that. Tonight I thought was the most emotional game, start to finish."

The power plays have fallen fairly evenly in the four games, but the Bruins have a 14-11 edge. Aside from the dust-up at the end, the B's didn't allow themselves to be goaded into retaliatory penalties after plays. Instead, the B's capitalized on two cross-checking penalties on Florida at the start with a pair of power-play goals.

"They seem to thrive on that. They build a lot of emotion in their game after whistles and creating scrums. A lot of guys gain momentum from that," Marchand said. "Hasn't really been the way that we've played all year, so when we can play hard between the whistles and then kind of skate away, it allows us to stay in the right mindset to play the way that we want to play.

"They play a very high-emotion game, all the way through. They're very physical. They like to get into it after whistles. A lot of guys talking, and that's their game. They've had a lot of success doing that. We've had success playing the way we play. We just have to remember to stick to that."

One of those cross-checking minors was a body shot from Tkachuk to Garnet Hathaway's back and ribs after the horn sounded to end the first.

"Yeah, it was a cross-check to the back. Most guys who play don't have a ton of padding there. Vulnerable spot," Hathaway said. "So, I'm going to be adding a lot more padding to my gear."

A couple of Panthers were in that scrum, and for Hathaway, who led the game with eight hits in 9:44 of ice time, it's all about taking numbers.

"It's pretty tough to see who it is, but there's video, so I'll be able to see it," he said. "There's stuff that happens that I'll be able to watch it. That's just part of the game, I guess."