The Bruins got the kind of scoreline that usually makes everything look clean: a 6-1 win over the Utah Mammoth. But the numbers underneath Thursday night told a messier story.
Boston lit the lamp three times in the first period and three more in the second, turning the game into a runaway before the third even arrived. David Pastrnak scored twice, and Casey Mittelstadt, Mason Lohrei, Morgan Geekie and Matthew Poitras each added a goal.
Still, the shot chart didn’t exactly match the scoreboard. By the end of 40 minutes, Utah had a 30-16 edge in shots on goal, even though Boston was sitting on a 6-0 lead at the second intermission.
That’s the split-screen read on this one for the Bruins: they were ruthless when chances came their way, but they also spent a lot of the night without the puck. Both truths matter.
Boston did plenty with very little. Six goals on 16 shots is a stunning rate of return, even if shot totals never tell the full story of chance quality.
The Bruins also cashed in with the power play, with Pastrnak scoring twice on the man advantage and Geekie adding another power-play goal. That meant three of Boston’s first five goals came with an extra skater.
Pastrnak wasn’t just finishing, either. He also set up Geekie’s goal and Poitras’ second-period score, making him a factor as both a scorer and a distributor.
For a team that needs production beyond its top threat, that kind of night carries obvious value. Five different Bruins scored, which made the performance feel broader than a one-man takeover.
Even with the lopsided result, the possession numbers leave room for caution. Utah kept putting pucks on net while Boston piled up goals, and that kind of efficiency is hard to bank on night after night. If the Bruins want this to hold up, they’ll need more stretches where they control the game instead of simply finishing it.
That concern sits alongside the bigger backdrop for Boston, which was trying to answer a rough night against Ottawa. The Bruins opened the season with two straight wins before a 4-1 loss to the Senators on Monday, a performance that did not fit the standard head coach Marco Sturm wants.
“Going back to our identity; going back to our game. We were not totally involved last game.
I really liked our first three games - that was more like us,” Sturm said. “Play a really good, structured, hard-to-play-against [style].”
Boston had already been looking for a reset when it faced Utah at TD Garden, and Sturm made changes to his forward lines in practice Wednesday in an effort to spark more offense. JJ Peterka, who has scored twice in his first four games with Boston, was expected to skate with Fraser Minten and Marat Khusnutdinov against his former team.
The Mammoth came in off a 5-3 win over the New Jersey Devils, giving Boston another test as it tried to get back to the structured, physical style Sturm wants. The Bruins got the result Thursday. The next question is whether the process can catch up to it.
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Bostons stance appears to have slowed things down, with the asking price believed to be steep enough to make any deal hard to line up. Edmontons recent addition of Filip Hallander may ease some of the pressure there, but the idea has not fully gone away, especially with the possibility that injuries or changing needs could reopen the conversation later. [Read more 🡒]