The streaky Bruins were able to continue trending in the right direction with their 4th straight win, 5th in 6 games, against the Islanders. The Bruins never led for a second of game time in this one, just would never go away, and were able to take advantage of a Khusty shootout goal to get the victory. Swayman looked good again between the pipes making 30 saves on 33 shots not including the 3 in the shootout. He made some great saves that prevented the Islanders from ever taking a 2-goal lead. The defense has been considerably better over this winning streak, especially McAvoy who has really elevated his game and has become more of a threat offensively, jumping into the rush and activating often within the offensive zone. His pairing with Zadorov gives him more freedom to roam. Zadorov provided a spark to the Bruins following the Islanders opening goal with his assault to the rookie phenom Matthew Schaefer serving 3 penalties from one scrum and dragging the Bruins into the fight, a necessary evil sometimes. The B’s responded with a wild deflection goal last touched by Arvidsson who has been providing more offense as of late. Unfortunately, a brutal neutral zone turnover by Morgan Geekie sent the Islanders 2 top forwards of Barzal (should have been drafted by the Bruins in 2015) and Bo Horvat in on a 2 on 1 ending in a Horvat goal quickly retaking the lead. Zacha notched another goal on the powerplay before the end of the 2nd period tying the game at 2 entering the 3rd period.

Another poorly defended rush led to Horvat’s second goal of the game as he snapped one
by Swayman 5 minutes into the 3rd period. 10 minutes later the Bruins were able to tie with
a great effort by Khusty off a rebound from Sorokin tied the game at 3. A great goal, falling to the ice and sweeping a back hander into the net. As mentioned before the Bruins were able to get the win in a shootout on a nice shoulder shake and shot from Khusty.

Some thoughts:
Far more positives of late for the Bruins. They look more organized and more aggressive as
a team and have cleaned up the d-zone. Getting contributions from depth players like
Mittlestadt, Arvidsson and Khusty is always a nice help for a team that lacks offensive fire
power. That being said, the Bruins need far more from Tanner Jeannot who has been absent
from scoring since 10/16 against Vegas. Just 5 points on the season through 15 games for a
guy making $3.4 million a year is simply not good enough. Not to mention, besides running
his mouth after the whistle, he hasn’t been a noticeable thorn in the side of opponents
either. He needs to have a greater impact on the game either via some offensive output or
his physicality. His contract was not well received by Bruins fans this offseason to begin
with, and he’s proving the point as to why.

I attended last Thursday’s for vs. Canes game here in Raleigh at the Lenovo. Old friend of
the Bruins organization Brandon Bussi started and played well in net for the Hurricanes. I
left with a sour taste watching Bussi’s performance after hoping the Bruins would shed
Korpisalo and his contract this past offseason and replace him with a AHL goalie like Bussi
or Michael DiPietro to back up Swayman. This would’ve saved the Bruins about $2 million a
year bringing the team salary cap space to near $4 million, plenty of money to add an
offensive asset. Instead, the front office opted for Korpisalo and his $3 million AAV (the
extra $1mil paid by OTT), and have been rewarded with his 3.48 GAA, and .882 SV% through his 6 games played this season. Bussi is 2.25 GAA with a .916 SV% through 4 games with the Canes, DiPietro is 5-0 with a 2.40 GAA and .914 SV% with Providence, coming off his Goaltender of the Year campaign from last season…

The Bruins are back in action tomorrow night (11/6) against the Ottawa Senators, a team
that beat them handedly just over a week ago.