There haven’t been an overabundance of feel-good moments for the Bruins over these final two months of the regular season, but a decisive road win over the Devils definitely amounted to what the B’s have been hoping to witness since the NHL trade deadline firesale.
Clearly it was an impressive, overall team effort in a 7-2 win over the New Jersey Devils at the Prudential Center on Tuesday night where 13 B’s skaters cracked the scoresheet. But it was more about how they won, and, more importantly, about the players that served key roles in that road victory.
Some of the young guys stepped up and that is often what’s needed on a hockey team in the midst of retooling their lineup.
“It was nice. You could sit back a little bit there in the third period and the guys were playing with a little more confidence,” said Joe Sacco. “They were making good decisions and playing the right way. And you get rewarded in this game when you play hard and you play the right way if you have good details and good habits.
“Everybody is being evaluated right now and for those [young] guys it’s an opportunity to show what they can do. They had good games tonight. It’s nice for different guys to get on the score sheet and we needed that.”
Hard-working defenseman Michael Callahan collected his first career NHL goal and put a cap on a transformative season where he’s been given an opportunity to show his potential by filling a role as a stay-at-home D-man on an NHL team moving forward. Fabian Lysell assisted on the pivotal Casey Mittelstadt goal at the end of the second period that essentially secured the two points for the Black and Gold, and the Bruins' former first-round pick played arguably his most effective NHL game to date using speed and aggressiveness to make an impact on the ice.
Mittelstadt makes it 4-2. Lysell’s first NHL point. pic.twitter.com/l8wYVCWeRg
— Mr. Tenkrat (@PeterTenkrat) April 9, 2025
Fraser Minten also scored his first goal as a member of the B’s after picking up a loose puck in front of the net and quickly snapped one under the bar for his third score of the season. Minten looked like the kind of instinctual, above-the-puck player that’s going to be a good two-way option for them with enough offense to play in a top-9 capacity.
That is good news for a Bruins team that is going to be sorely in need of young center help on their top three lines for next season and beyond.
“It was an awesome feeling and fun to be able to contribute to a game like that,” said Minten, who arrived in Boston along with a first-round pick in exchange for Bruins defenseman Brandon Carlo. “Each game you feel more comfortable, and you get more reps touching the puck and making plays.”
Even Mason Lohrei finished with a strong effort in 21:33 of ice time with a plus-1 rating, and filled the stat sheet with five shot attempts, a hit and three blocked shots while paying attention to the D-man job at both ends of the ice.
On a hockey team playing out the string with no pressing Stanley Cup playoff hopes, it is the young players and prospects that one would want to see excelling or running with the late-season opportunity they’ve been given. That’s exactly what happened in Tuesday’s win over the Devils, and it might serve as the last true feel-good moment of the season for the Bruins.
"I mean, things haven't been going great recently," said Callahan. "It's nice to have that kind of good feeling again. A lot of guys really stepped up and we got a couple milestones…[so] it feels good.
"The past couple of months have been so awesome for me to get a shot with the big club. I just try to keep coming in every day, work as hard as I can to help the team any way. So getting the win tonight and contributing feels good."
It wasn’t just the young players showing a little long-term glimmer on their game, either. There were other notable Bruins milestones as well. Morgan Geekie has been on a second-half tear and that continued on Tuesday night with his career-high 30th goal of the season, a milestone that’s undoubtedly going to earn him a few more dollars as a restricted free agent in the offseason.
And David Pastrnak capped off a brilliant individual second half by hitting the 100-point mark for the third consecutive season while truly carrying a Bruins offensive group where No. 88 is basically doubling up the next point leader (52 points for Geekie) in Black and Gold. That is truly shouldering a huge offensive burden and it’s something Pastrnak has continued to accomplish over the last couple of seasons.
Clearly Pastrnak was proud of hitting that elite century mark again, but also kept it firmly in perspective contrasted with the utter failure of this B’s team this season from a team perspective.
"I don't take it for granted (reaching 100 points) because it's hard to score in this League so it's tough to comment on it at this point," said Pastrnak. "I'm just happy we got the win and hope we can finish the season with good games and make sure we finish strong and try to build something moving forward.
"I wish it would be under better circumstances. It’s good, but nothing changes for me. There is only one thing that I’m chasing.”
With three games remaining and the Bruins currently sitting with the fourth-worst record in the NHL, the elusive Stanley Cup that Pastrnak is chasing is obviously going to have to wait for at least a few years down the road. But at least there was a reprieve on Tuesday night where some of the things Bruins management had been hoping to see out of this rag tag B’s group actually materialized, even if it might just be a temporary blip on a downward spiral that’s been taking place now for months.