Bruins must rally in front of home crowd
VANCOUVER -- The Boston Bruins couldn't have enjoyed the scenery late Saturday night while their team bus crawled through the raucous street party that consumed downtown Vancouver after the Canucks moved halfway to their first NHL title.
Maybe the Stanley Cup Finals' move to the East Coast will finally give the Bruins something to celebrate.
With Game 3 looming tonight at TD Garden after a quick cross-continent trip yesterday, the Bruins realize the jam they brought back from Canada isn't sweet.
Only four teams have rallied from an 0-2 Finals deficit in 46 tries. Boston must win four of the next five games to beat the Canucks, the NHL's best regular-season team and the winner of seven of their past eight playoff games.
"We'll be disappointed, and we're allowed to be," said 43-year-old Mark Recchi, who ended an 11-game goal drought with a power-play score in Game 2. "But we'll take a lot of positives out of these games. When we get off that plane, we'll forget all about it. We'll worry about Monday, and doing our job at home."
Recchi is right: The Bruins probably shouldn't spend any time contemplating the historic depth of their plight.
Boston has rallied from an 0-2 deficit to win a series just once in 27 tries -- although it happened in the first round of this postseason against Montreal.
"Now is not the time to squeeze your stick and to panic," Bruins forward Patrice Bergeron said after the team arrived in Boston Sunday. "It's time to go back to what's been giving us success . . . Squeezing our sticks is not going to help us at all. We've got to go out there, play our game, make sure we play loose, and at the same time, play hard and desperate."
Vancouver dominated the third period for the second straight game, with Daniel Sedin tying it midway through before Alex Burrows won it with his thrilling wraparound goal 11 seconds into overtime.
"We have four lines that go out there and play the same way," said Sedin, the NHL scoring champion. "We get pucks deep. We forecheck really hard. It wears teams down. It's been like this the whole season. It's nothing new for us. I think when we're at our best, we usually have a lot of success in the third period."
Coach Claude Julien will remind his Bruins that they largely played well in two one-goal losses. Their defense held the Canucks' top line scoreless for the first five periods of the series, bullying Daniel and Henrik Sedin into ineffectiveness.
What's more, Boston still hasn't lost a Game 3 in the postseason, even winning a pressure-packed game at Montreal in the first round after losing the first two games at home.
