Bruins call on experience

Before the playoffs began, the Bruins were the overwhelming favorites to represent the Eastern Conference in the Stanley Cup finals. They chewed through the second half of the regular season in a way few Bruins teams have, and they earned home-ice advantage throughout the postseason.
Tonight’s Game 7 at the Garden is the perfect opportunity to prove themselves as a top seed and erase memories of Game 6 in Montreal, where the Bruins appeared to be crumbling under the weight of that imaginary crown worn by favorites. And they will have to do it against a Canadiens team that now has the confidence of plucky underdogs who truly believe they have the giant on the ropes.
The two teams, of course, are a lot closer in strength and talent than David and Goliath, but it’s clear the Habs are running with that role.
“We’re going to have to win Game 7 to fully get Boston’s respect,” Canadiens winger Dale Weise said in the aftermath of Monday night’s 4-0 pummeling of the Bruins.
Weise has done everything possible to knock the B’s — namely Milan Lucic — down a peg. After scoring to give the Habs a 3-0 lead in Game 3, he mocked Lucic’s chest-thumping goal celebration. And then there was his Game 6 biceps-flexing, mimicking Lucic from the B’s winger’s Game 5 confrontation with P.K. Subban.
Tonight, the B’s have to ignore that noise. They also have to forget about Andrei Markov’s stick shot to Zdeno Chara’s groin that started a ruckus at the end of Game 6.
When you are the better team — and the Bruins are, however slim the margin — that stuff accomplishes nothing. This is Game 7. The only thing that matters is the hockey.
“You go in there, you give it your best shot, as a coach, as players, as a team, and you go from there,” B’s coach Claude Julien said yesterday. “We’ve been through those many times, and you hope that your experience is going to help you get through.”
The Bruins already have played eight Game 7’s in the Julien era, winning four. One of those victories came at the expense of the Habs in overtime in 2011, and the B’s went on to win the Cup. The winners of tonight’s contest can rightly believe they have a legitimate shot of capturing Lord Stanley’s giant beer mug, perhaps even more so than in 2011 when the teams met in the first round.
For that team to be the Bruins, something has to happen. The young defensemen have to regain the composure they’ve displayed during these playoffs but went missing Monday, and Tuukka Rask cannot fail to make the easy saves.
Most importantly, the B’s need better from their trusted veterans. Up front, they have relied too heavily on Carl Soderberg’s line. The trio (with Loui Eriksson and Matt Fraser) has played admirably in this series, but the strain began to show in Game 6.
David Krejci’s line has taken the most flak in this series, and deservedly so. It has been a shell of itself, and it would help if Lucic could get past his case of the yips.
But the Patrice Bergeron line, with Reilly Smith and Brad Marchand, also had a bad night Monday. Perhaps the team’s most consistent line in the postseason, it looked like a unit that was overthinking, sending ill-fated passes into occupied lanes and letting promising plays die on the vine.
And after a good performance in Game 5, the fourth line of Gregory Campbell, Daniel Paille and Shawn Thornton was not able to bring the energy it normally delivers.
Now is the time for everyone to play like favorites. And it wouldn’t hurt if captain Zdeno Chara picked up his game after being beaten for the game-changing Max Pacioretty goal Monday.