Bruins Nation

Ray Bourque's son beat the Bruins with two minutes to go on Saturday. The game was fun though, and the Garden had 13,000 fans in it, a lot for a meaningless game. Hopefully the Garden continues to fill up. Hockey teams play better when home ice means a packed and loud arena. During the 4-3 loss, Blake Wheeler, Andrew Ference, and Petteri Nokelainen scored.

A few quick notes on the game:

the Sobotka-Yelle-Nokelainen line played very well. Sobotka and Nokelainen are on the chopping block because of guys like Thompson and Wheeler, but they are playing hard and making it a tough decision for Julien.

"Special teams" was disastrous. The Bruins gave up two power play goals and failed twice to score with a 5 on 3 advantage.

Tim Thomas was shaky. He did not look like the Tim Thomas we all love. He gave up a few goals that he normally wouldn't. I guess that's what the pre-season is for.

On Monday night the Bruins spanked the Montreal Canadiens. I listened to the game on the radio via the internet (thank you, CJAD). The Bruins won 8-3. The Bruins and Habs also engaged in four fights. The best was Shawn Thornton beating the daylights out of Steve Begin (who is a very dirty player and deserved the multiple shots to the head that Thornton gave him).

The Bruins lost in their second and third game 2-1 against the Islanders and then Red Wings. Neither game was on the radio. John Bishop of BostonBruins.com did a nice job of updating every other minute, but it's just not the same.

I found a radio feed from Detriot for last night's game and was able to listen to the Bruins beat the Red Wings 2-1. Tuuka Rask played very well. Meanwhile Michael Ryder scored his first goal of the preseason. I was very impressed with the defense. The Red Wings had their stars on the ice (which now includes Marian Hossa), and our defense didn't have Chara or Wideman, yet the Wings only scored once.

I'm heading off to the Garden soon to see the Bruins take on the Capitals (with my new season tickets!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!). I'm not sure who's going to play. I'm hoping Sturm-Bergeron-Kessel (a very productive line against the Habs) will play this afternoon. Meanwhile, Fernandez, Kessel, and Schaefer have minor injuries and won't play. Kobasew, Hnidy, and Chara have yet to play in a pre-season game, they are still recovering from injuries sustained last season.

Go Bruins! (and if they do play today, Yankees suck as well)

Go here http://www.971theticket.com/ to listen to the game against the Red Wings on the radio. Bruins are up 1-0 on a PJ Axelsson goal.

update John Bishop has come up big for Bruins fans. The game can be listened to on CJAD

The pre-season game starts at 6:00. I can't find any television or radio coverage of the game. I'm sure John Bishop (The Bear Essentials) and Fluto Shinzawa (Boston Globe Bruins Blog) will have updates during the game.

I'm not sure which Canadiens are playing. It would be nice to read what Bishop and Shinzawa think of Carey Price if he plays. Hopefully he'll be the victim of a sophomore slump.

As for the Bruins, group A will play tonight. The lines from Saturday's group A practice are. Keep in mind that Nastiuk, Chara, and Bodnarchuk are not playing tonight.

Marco Sturm - Patrice Bergeron - Phil Kessel
P.J. Axelsson - David Krejci - Chuck Kobasew
Brad Marchand - Vladimir Sobotka - Shawn Thornton
Jeremy Reich - Thompson/Sauve - Byron Bitz

Zdeno Chara - Adam McQuaid
Andrew Bodnarchuk - Andrew Ference
Andrew Alberts - Jeff Penner
Ryan Stokes - Shane Hnidy

Manny Fernandez
Kevin Regan
Kevin Nastiuk

On the third day of TSN's "30 teams in 30 days" article series, TSN focused on the Boston Bruins. It's worth reading. You probably know it all by now, but it's a good concise breakdown.

A snippet:

Sports fans in Boston have been spoiled rotten with the Celtics, Red Sox and New England Patriots all reaching their respective championship finals over the last 12 months. That leaves the Bruins - a long-standing Original Six team with a great legacy of their own - as an outsider by comparison. But Chiarelli and Julien appear to have this club going in the right direction. If they can build on last year's success in the regular season and playoffs, they just might be mentioned in the same breath as their championship-calibre peers.

Coming from TSN, the Boston Bruins have signed Flames free agent Stephane Yelle. The NHL veteran signed for $750,000. I don't know why the Bruins want another center. The only thing I can think of is that Chiarelli wants the veteran presence. Yelle has 17 goals and 37 assists since the lockout.

a cool fact: Stephane Yelle played with Ray Bourque on the 2001 Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche.

The internet has lit up upon the news that 4 goalies, 12 skaters, and Zdeno Chara showed up at Ristuccia Arena today (Chara didn't skate).

From what I read, it sounds like Tim Thomas, Manny Fernandez, Tuuka Rask, and Kevin Regan participated in a goalie camp with Bob Essensa. After that, the goalies participated in a scrimmage with Milan Lucic, Andrew Bodnarchuk, Brad Marchand, David Krejci, Phil Kessel, Nate Thompson, Andrew Alberts, Shane Hnidy, PJ Axelsson, Marc Savard, Marco Sturm, and Mark Stuart.

Surprisingly, Fluto Shinzawa did not update his blog on what went on in Wilmington. This leads me to believe that he's hard at work writing an article for tomorrow's Globe, so keep your eyes peeled for that.