The Boston Bruins punched their Game 7 ticket last weekend to guarantee at least two more weeks of playoff hockey in the Hub.
It could be a “be careful what you ask for” situation as they tangle with a Florida Panthers team that rolled through the first round against Tampa Bay, and, of course, dispatched the B’s last postseason in a seven game first round series.
“Very similar team. Their depth is there,” said Boston Bruins GM Don Sweeney ahead of Boston’s departure for Ft. Lauderdale on Sunday. “They play the right way, they don’t give up a lot of scoring chances. The series should be tight. Power play is good, (Sergei) Bobrovsky has played well. [Anthony] Stolarz has played well.
“It’s a hell of an opponent. I think we know each other pretty well — where our strengths are. It’s just going to come down to winning the small areas of the game that generally translate throughout a series and hopefully we find a way to persevere this year.”
Then again, the Bruins won all four games against the Panthers during the regular season and proved to be a good matchup against an Atlantic Division rival that eventually surpassed them while winning the division at the end of the regular season.
Regardless of how things went down in the regular season, however, the B’s go into this second matchup as underdogs when the casual observer takes a look at the two rosters.
With that in mind, here’s a breakdown of the matchup between the Bruins and Panthers:
FORWARDS
The Panthers are a little bit shorthanded to start the series with the gritty Sam Bennett still injured and not playing in Game 1, but there is no shortage of talent in a deep Florida group. Both Matthew Tkachuk and Carter Verhaeghe finished with nine points in the five playoff games against the Tampa Bay Lightning and did plenty of damage in the first round against the Bruins last season. Sam Reinhart had kind of a quiet first round after a brilliant regular season and still ended up with three goals in five games against the Bolts. Have we even mentioned perennial Selke Trophy candidate Sasha Barkov yet either? On the Bruins side, Brad Marchand was Boston’s best forward in the seven-game series against the Maple Leafs, and David Pastrnak might have finally unlocked his playoff explosiveness by collecting the first OT game-winner in the playoffs of his NHL career in the Game 7 dispatching of Toronto. Bennett may end up being an X-Factor when he finally gets into the series after being so good against the B’s last spring.
Edge: Florida.
The call from Sean McDonough is just outstanding. One of the best in the Biz. What a great Stanley Cup playoff moment pic.twitter.com/TxDcm2Er2x
— Joe Haggerty (@HackswithHaggs) May 6, 2024
DEFENSEMEN
This is going to be a difference-making category. The Bruins' defensemen struggled mightily against the suffocating, physical Florida forecheck that pinned them back last spring, and many of the players on both sides are still the same. Hampus Lindholm is coming off the best playoff game of his NHL career where he played a pivotal role in the B’s winning Game 7, but he did not play well in the first round against Florida last year. Charlie McAvoy was Boston’s best D-man in that series, but he is going to be expected to do yeoman’s work again this time around. How will young D-men like Mason Lohrei and Parker Wotherspoon fare against a veteran, aggressive Panthers team? The question remains to be answered. On the other side, Gus Forsling, Brandon Montour and Aaron Ekblad are a formidable top-3 and Niko Mikkola has added size and toughness to the top four D-men for the Panthers. It’s really difficult seeing this as an advantage for the Bruins unless A) McAvoy can avoid getting worn down by Florida B) Lohrei steps up in a major way and B) the Bruins can dig into Florida’s defensemen depth a little bit.
Edge: Florida.
GOALTENDING
Sergei Bobrovsky is a Vezina Trophy finalist and a very experienced postseason goaltender at this point. His entry into the series last spring against Boston was a turning point for the Panthers. But Bobrovsky did not have a great performance against the Lightning in the first round with an .896 save percentage against an admittedly talented Tampa Bay bunch. On the other hand, Jeremy Swayman is being talked about as a possible Conn Smythe Trophy candidate after his first-round brilliance where he was one of the biggest reasons that the B’s advanced past the Maple Leafs. Swayman leads all NHL goalies with a 1.49 GAA and a .950 save percentage thus far in the Stanley Cup playoffs and it really presents the Bruins with an interesting decision as to whether they return to the goalie rotation in some form or fashion for the second round. Still, this is the unquestioned strength of Boston’s team and should be an ace in the hole for them against a stacked Florida deck.
Advantage: Boston.
SPECIAL TEAMS
One thing we saw in the first round is that the teams with the best special teams play were the teams that advanced. Boston scored at over a 35 percent clip on their power play and completely shut down Toronto’s power play with a penalty kill that was backboned by Swayman. Florida was perfectly fine with a 23.1 percent success rate on their PP unit and killed off 80 percent of the Tampa PPs they saw in the first round. So this is a couple of teams with good special teams’ units where this could be an edge based on performance. What remains to be seen is if the Bruins PP can repeat what they did in the first round against what was a very poor Leafs penalty kill unit. We’ll give the edge to the Bruins based on their first-round performance, but it’s a slight one that feels like more of a wash than anything else.
Advantage: Boston.
COACHING/INTANGIBLES
Getting over the first-round hump was a big deal for Jim Montgomery. After exhibiting a mostly softer touch with his Bruins players over the last couple of seasons, he called out David Pastrnak after Game 6 and his game-breaking winger responded with an overtime game-winner in Game 7 against the Maple Leafs. It was the biggest goal of Pastrnak’s ridiculously productive career to date. But Montgomery still is relatively inexperienced when it comes to these playoff settings. Paul Maurice is experienced, poised and has been exactly what this Panthers team needed at this point in their team development path, and had them on the verge of the Stanley Cup last season. Maurice also outcoached Montgomery last spring in their first-round series. Will the confidence boost from the first-round victory change the paradigm of all this? It might to some degree, but the images of the Panthers pushing around the Bruins are too difficult to ignore until the Bruins, top-to-bottom, show that they are willing to start doing the pushing this time around.
Advantage: Florida.
PREDICTION
The Bruins may be able to ride the momentum of their thrilling first-round series win into a good start to this second-round series, but Florida is the better, deeper and tougher playoff team.
Panthers in 6 games.
