For a long stretch, Canadiens-Bruins was one of those NHL matchups that demanded attention the second it hit the schedule. It was never just about the hockey.
The real draw was the edge, the animosity, the sense that every meeting could tip over into something ugly before the night was over. That feeling has dulled in recent years, and now the rivalry that once felt combustible can look, at times, like just another game on the calendar.
That is a far cry from how this thing looked a decade ago. Montreal and Boston, two Original Six franchises with history baked into every meeting, used to bring out the worst in each other in the best possible way.
The 2010s had plenty of moments that kept the temperature high: Carey Price and Tim Thomas getting into an all-too-rare goalie fight, the controversy around Zdeno Chara’s hit on Max Pacioretty, Andrew Ference flashing the middle finger to the Canadiens crowd, and P.K. Subban’s reverse hit on Brad Marchand.
Those games had bite.
The playoff history only made it sharper. The Canadiens and Bruins have met 34 times in the postseason, with Montreal winning 25 series to Boston’s 9.
In the 2010s alone, they crossed paths twice, and both series went the distance. In 2011, Montreal jumped out to a 2-0 lead before Boston rallied to win in seven and went on to capture the Stanley Cup.
Three years later, the Canadiens got their revenge, clawing back from a 3-2 deficit to win two straight and knock off the Presidents’ Trophy-winning Bruins. Even the handshake line turned into a talking point, with Milan Lucic’s comments to Dale Weise stirring controversy.
Since then, though, the playoff stage has gone quiet between them, and that has mattered. Boston stayed near the top of the league for much of the next decade, while Montreal had trouble building and keeping talent, and the postseason appearances became harder to find.
Without those high-stakes meetings, the old heat started to fade. Rivalries need both sides pulling their weight, and for a while the Bruins were simply the better team.
That shift also changed the Canadiens’ own hierarchy of enemies. Toronto moved to the front of the line, and Ottawa became a more meaningful matchup than Boston for stretches.
It’s a strange twist, especially since the Canadiens and Bruins still see each other four times a season, just like Montreal and Toronto do outside the COVID-19 season. The schedule has been there.
The spark hasn’t.
Still, this rivalry has not gone away for good. Montreal is on the rise, Boston is still usually in the mix, and the ingredients are there for the fire to come back. All it may take is one long playoff series - one seven-game grind - to remind everyone what Canadiens-Bruins used to feel like.
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