Sunday, June 23, 2013

Day 84: Bad News: Bruins Lose Game 5 and Patrice Bergeron.

How do the Bruins survive another game in this series without their heart and soul? Patrice Bergeron left game five early last night after playing just 49 seconds in the second period. There was no immediate indication that Bergeron was severely hurt, but the Bruins tweeted in the third period that he had been taken to an area hospital in an ambulance. The only good news on that is that he walked to the ambulance on his own.

When Bergeron gingerly skated off the ice early in the second period in last night's 3-1 loss then never came back on, you just knew it wasn't a good sign. While the Bruins did score their only goal in the third period after Bergeron's departure, he was sorely missed in the last minute of the game when the B's pulled Rask and added another attacker. He's the first guy you want out there—he has had three goals in the last two game.

The Boston Herald described what losing Bergeron does to his team perfectly. "With no Bergeron the Bruins would be minus their top goalscorer in the series, the No. 1 face-off man in the postseason, one of the strongest shutdown defensive forwards in the NHL, and a top penalty-killer."

Initial reports claim it's a leg injury, but that's all anyone is saying right now. I'm sure more information will be released later today but for now, there are a lot questions surrounding the future of Patrice in this series. And if the Bruins lose him for the rest of the series, game six is going to be a tough, uphill battle. Especially with the Blackhawks really stepping up both sides of their play the past couple nights.

If you missed the game last night, be happy. It wasn't pretty. Once again the Bruins were out-skated. There's a hint of desperation in the Hawks that has made them about two steps faster than any Boston skater. Chicago won the shots on goal battle 32-25, but it didn't feel like the Bruins had 25 shots. They had very few instances where there was someone in position for a rebound, making most of their scoring chances just one shot and done.

As with most of the games, the Bruins crushed the Hawks in the checking department (53-22) but how many times did a Boston player choose to take the body rather than the puck, leaving the puck up for grabs? And how many of those translated to scoring chances for Chicago? I have no idea...

Back to Boston we go for a critical game six on Monday. It's do or die for the Bruins and there's a strong chance they'll have to "do" without Patrice Bergeron.

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