It was abundantly clear with the Boston Bruins on the brink of playoff elimination that their best players needed to step up if they were going to keep their season alive.
That’s exactly what happened in Buffalo as David Pastrnak scored an overtime game-winner to lead the Bruins to a 2-1 win in Game at KeyBank Center on Tuesday night that extended the postseason run back to Boston on Friday night.
The Black and Gold’s big dogs showed up to play in a must-win game and made certain that they would get at least one more game on home ice. It was a fitting display of backbone and pride for a hockey team that responded all season long when they were backed into a corner, so it reasoned that the playoffs would be no different for experienced, prideful impact players like No. 88, who finished with a game-high seven shots on net and 12 shot attempts.
“In general, the whole team…it was a big buy-in today. A big response from the other night when we were all embarrassed. We wanted to show the real Boston Bruins and we did that today,” said Marco Sturm. “Big moments and big games, that’s when your big guys need to step up. It started with Jeremy Swayman, a few guys on D and with a guy like David [Pastrnak] to finish it up. That’s what we needed.
“We didn’t steal a win here. I thought that was well-deserved. We had the mindset. We talked enough and we could hear enough that we couldn’t wait to get out there and prove everybody wrong and show that [the Game 4 loss] wasn’t our team.”
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It was a beautiful goal with Hampus Lindholm connecting with Pastrnak on a long lead pass just as they did against Toronto in the playoffs a couple of years ago, and No. 88 doing the rest with a nasty double move on Alex Lyon before curling the puck around the Buffalo netminder for the game-winner.
It went beyond Pastrnak responding, however, as Elias Lindholm also played a strong game, where he scored in the second period to tie things up and topped 21 minutes of ice time in one of his best games of the season. Hampus Lindholm had a strong rebound effort as well before assisting on Pastrnak’s game-winner with 21:54 of ice time, and stepped up at a time when the Bruins needed solid play on the back end.
Morgan Geekie didn’t factor in the scoring, but totaled 11 shot attempts in a strong game, while Pavel Zacha missed the net on a couple of Grade-A scoring chances through the first couple of periods of play. It was impressive up and down the lineup, however, as the Bruins soldiered on without the injured Viktor Arvidsson, and got solid forechecking and energy contributions from Mikey Eyssimont and Alex Steeves in their first appearances in the playoff series.
“You’ve got a little confidence going into those situations because you’ve been there before. We stuck to our hockey that makes us good out there," said Hampus Lindholm. "We were patient and we got rewarded. You’re going to see a different Boston Bruins team at home. We’ll go home, play our hockey and enjoy the moment. We’ll keep play our style and hopefully we get rewarded.”
And Jeremy Swayman walked the walk after talking the talk, challenging his teammates as he exited the ice in the third period of the Game 4 debacle, and stopped 26-of-27 shots, getting beaten only by an unlucky bounce in the first period that led to a Rasmus Dahlin power play goal.
Other than that, Swayman was locked in making leg pad saves on Tage Thompson, Jack Quinn and Tyson Kozak on what looked like certain goals, and improved to a 4-2 record with a .930 save percentage in Stanley Cup playoff elimination games in his career. Swayman gave the appearance of a goalie determined not to let anything fluky get by him, tracking the puck well while shutting down anything that bounced around the net, while his defensemen played strongly around the house.
“I think we stepped up in big moments and played with raw emotion,” said Swayman. “Guys were selling out their bodies [to block shots] and recognizing that every moment was important.”
It is games like Tuesday night’s Game 5 that gave the Bruins the confidence to sign Swayman to a long-term, big-money contract as he consistently lives up to his reputation as a proven playoff performer.
It’s not a big surprise that the Bruins responded to last weekend’s embarrassing Game 4 loss and showed the kind of resiliency and character that they have consistently brandished all season, amidst the highs and lows of the regular season. But the bigger challenge awaiting them is to replicate that kind of 60-minute, concerted, and determined effort at TD Garden, where they have consistently lost playoff games over the last handful of years, with an abysmal 3-10 record in home playoff games over the last four postseasons.
That was certainly on the mind of No. 88 after scoring the overtime playoff game-winner as the Bruins will now get another chance to atone for subpar postseason efforts on home ice in Game 3 and Game 4 of the series.
“We have a big game to play at home in front of our fans. We wanted to get this one so we could get it back to Boston to our fans, so we could show them that we don’t have any quit in us,” said Pastrnak on NESN before he was asked what his message was to the fans back in Boston. "Be loud...but be patient. We're gonna shoot the puck. Don't worry."
It’s a great deal less worrisome for anybody associated with the Bruins when their best players begin embracing the big moments and producing in the playoffs, but the challenge will be there to do it again on Friday, with an important two days of rest in between playoff games when the first round playoff series resumes later this week.