Boston’s Brad Marchand celebrates his goal against Florida Panthers with Pavel Zacha during the second period of the Bruins’ 3-1 win in Game 1 of their first-round series on Monday in Boston. Winslow Townson/Associated Press
The news on the Patrice Bergeron was not all that promising for Game 2 against the Florida Panthers. Coach Jim Montgomery said he was “feeling better” but termed him as “questionable” but he did not participate in the team’s optional practice and hasn’t skated since leaving game No. 82 with an upper body injury.
The good news? The captain’s replacement demonstrated that he was capable of doing the job – and doing it against one of the best two-way centermen in the league.
Pavel Zacha stepped into Bergeron’s usual spot between Jake DeBrusk and Brad Marchand and drew the assignment of facing Sasha Barkov’s line. He made key plays throughout the game. With the Bruins clinging to a 2-1 lead late in the second period, he bumped Barkov off a loose puck behind the Florida net, setting off the wild scramble that resulted in Jake DeBrusk’s goal that gave the Bruins some much needed breathing room and allowed them to clamp down in the third period. Zacha also finished in the black in the faceoff circle, winning 7 of 12 in the head-to-head matchup with Barkov and 10-of-17 overall.
“I knew it was going to be a challenge, but that’s the exciting part about hockey. You want to play in those situations against players like that,” said Zacha. “I was assigned the Barkov line with Marchie and JD and it was just kind of two lines against each other. The plus-minus, you always want to win that battle. That’s the exciting part for me, to be in those situations and play against those lines.”
When Zacha was acquired from the New Jersey Devils for Erik Haula in the offseason, he was obtained to play wing for this season, but with an eye toward converting him back to center in the future whenever Bergeron and David Krejci decide to retire.
He got some looks in the middle down the stretch when Krejci was injured and Bergeron was rested on some back-to-backs. You could see his game growing from one opportunity to the next, and it has throughout the season.
“I think No. 1, it’s how hard he competes with skill on puck,” said Montgomery when asked where he’s seen the biggest improvement throughout the year. “He wins a lot of battles for us now, he kills a lot of plays, he protects pucks, makes plays. To me, it’s how hard he is with his skill and his ability on pucks. He wants to be first on pucks. And because of that, it’s just builds our team game.”
Zacha could not be in a better spot to become a good faceoff man with the centermen he’s with on this team as well as assistant coach Chris Kelly. Montgomery also believes he has the aptitude to excel in that department.
“Being around Krejci, (Tomas) Nosek and Bergeron helps you. They talk about the art of winning faceoffs. He’s a student of the game, so he picks up stuff real easily,” said Montgomery.
Bergeron was very present in the locker room on Monday (suggesting, by the way, he’s on the sideline because of injury and not illness). Zacha said Bergeron was instrumental on Monday night, giving him tips on faceoffs as well as settling him down.
“He talked to me a little bit. I told him I hadn’t played playoffs in a little while (since 2018) and he calmed me down and told me to have fun and just battle hard,” said Zacha. “I had a couple of questions with faceoffs that he could help me with in the game. Just seeing him around, having little questions in between periods, it’s great that he’s still around and he can talk to you there, even if he’s not playing.”
Now the stakes are raised. Instead of getting valuable experience in quasi-meaningless games at the end of the regular season, it’s the playoffs. Everything matters. It seems like he’s been building for this moment from the day he arrived in training camp.
“It helps coming to a new team, knowing I’m going to get an opportunity that I wanted and taking advantage of it is big for me,” said Zacha. “There’s many things that I can get better at every day. Playoffs are here now and I’m trying to prove that I can be a playoff player. It doesn’t stop with one game.”
MONTGOMERY SAID TAYLOR Hall was one of the Bruins better players. His speed helped to create several odd-man rushes.
“I thought his details and habits were excellent and then you combine that with his speed, it creates mismatches for us,” said Montgomery. “He had three chances that came from real good D-zone plays by him that led to offensive chances. One was by him and two were by (Trent Frederic).”
The two saves on Frederic were highlights of Alex Lyon’s game, but if that third line can keep creating those chances, the Bruins will be tough to beat.
“They came from good defensive posture. We weren’t cheating to get those chances,” said Hall. “Would have loved to see one of them go in, but I know Fred’s good for it. He’s going to be a big contributor for us in the playoffs and he’s been all season. But it’s nice to get odd-man rushes, it’s nice to see 2-on-1s and 3-on-2s that come from good posture. Over the course of the series, that’s an important thing. And we limited them to two odd-man rushes, so we took away a strength of their game, too.”
THOUGH LYON GAVE up a very bad goal to Brad Marchand that turned out to be the winner, Florida Coach Paul Maurice said he was “fantastic” in Game 1. But Maurice wasn’t ready to say whether Lyon or more established veteran Sergei Bobrovsky would get the start in Game 2.
MONTGOMERY ON BERGON’S hockey IQ: “Off the charts. I learn from him every game. He’ll say something on the bench and (I’ll think) ‘Uh-huh. I’m going to start talking about that now.’ ”
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