Three days after their worst third period of the season, the Bruins delivered their best of one of the year.
Boston erased a two-goal deficit after the second intermission as David Pastrnak’s goal with 1:47 left gave the Bruins a dramatic, 3-2 victory at the Enterprise Center.
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How unlikely was this comeback?
The Bruins have been brutal in the third period this year. On Saturday against Ottawa, Boston didn’t even get a shot on goal in the final 20 minutes of regulation. They were 0-7-0 when trailing after two periods and had scored five third-period goals all year.
A pair of maligned Bruins led the comeback early in the third period. On a break-in, the Blues played Pastrnak to shoot, but he instead fed Morgan Geekie. The forward, who’d been a healthy scratch for three straight games, beat Jordan Binnington, 4:53 into the third to make it 2-1.
Charlie McAvoy, whose power play struggles have made him the face of that unit’s recent woes, tied the game on an even-strength one-timer with 10:45 left to make it 2-2.
Pastrnak completed the comeback with a one-timer of a McAvoy pass through traffic to seal the win.
Jeremy Swayman made 20 saves for the Bruins.
The Bruins are at Dallas, on Saturday at 8 p.m.
Takeaways
The Bruins are likely to make a roster move — The first-period injury to Hampus Lindholm left the Bruins with just 17 healthy players for the remainder of the game. Unless the workhorse defenseman, who was second on the team in playing time, recovers quickly, Boston will need to have someone from Providence meet them on the road. They aren’t carrying any extra skaters on the trip.
Because they’ll have less than 18 healthy players, they could make the call-up on an “emergency basis” according to league rules.
Bruins can’t contain St. Louis’ bad power play — The Blues came with a power play struggling even more than the Bruins’. St, Louis was statistically the league’s worst power play at 10.8 percent. The Bruins were in a three-way tie for 29th at 12.5 percent.
But a pair of bad Bruins penalties allowed the Blues to find their rhythm.
Exactly a minute after Cole Koepke went to the box for an offensive-zone high stick, Brayden Schenn made it 1-0. Almost exactly a minute after that, Pastrnak, who continues to commit penalties at a rate much higher than at any point in his career, was called for a high stick. Oskar Sundqvist made that one hurt too, giving the home team a 2-0 lead with 7:48 left in the second.
Morgan Geekie looked energized — Playing for the first time in four games, Morgan Geekie appeared to have something extra in his legs as Jim Montgomery put him at left wing with Pavel Zacha and Pastrnak.
His second-period goal was his first of the season and the first regular season goal in just shy of seven months. He did score four times in the playoffs.
