The Bruins’ playoff story might have looked a whole lot different if they had finished off Game 1.
Boston opened its series against the Buffalo Sabres by controlling the night and building a 2-0 lead late in the third period, only to watch it slip away when Buffalo scored three times in four-and-a-half minutes. That collapse ended up looming even larger after the Bruins’ Game 6 loss knocked them out of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, because it fed the argument that this team was too far from true contention to justify standing pat at the trade deadline.
But the first game still hangs over the series for a reason. The Bruins were eight minutes away from going back to Boston with a 2-0 lead, and they had already given fans reason to dream about a surprising run behind Jeremy Swayman and a bracket that featured some questionable playoff teams in the Atlantic Division. They looked strong again in Game 2 as well, which only adds to the what-if feeling around the opening two games.
There’s no way to know whether a Bruins win in Game 1 would have changed the way Buffalo responded in Game 2 or whether the Sabres would have still settled the series into a 1-1 tie. What is clear is that Boston had a real path in front of it if it had simply closed out that first game.
That matters even more when you look at what came next. Buffalo advanced to face the Montreal Canadiens, a team that won in seven games but leaned heavily on goaltending.
The Sabres controlled large stretches of that series, and based on how Boston looked at times against Buffalo, the Bruins could have posed the same kind of problem for Montreal. Boston also went 2-1-1 against the Canadiens in the regular season.
None of that proves the rest of the postseason would have broken Boston’s way. It’s all speculation.
Still, the rush to bury the Bruins after Round 1 has tended to overlook how close they were to changing the entire tone of the series with one finish in Game 1. In the end, that missed chance became the hinge point.
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