BOSTON — The Bruins were supposed to leave right after their overtime loss to the Rangers on Monday night.
Shower, get dressed, get out of New York and back to Massachusetts with Tuesday’s game against Nashville at TD Garden looming.
But Mother Nature wasn’t having it.
The Bruins had smartly gotten to New York a day early on Saturday to beat the snowstorm on Sunday, but what normally would have been a quick turnaround turned into a three-night excursion.
Neither flying nor busing was safe on Monday night so they stayed another night and left early on Tuesday. They arrived at Hanscom Airport at 1:30 p.m. less than 6 hours before they were scheduled to meet Nashville. The Predators had been in Boston since late Saturday after arriving early to beat the storm.
The Bruins landed to find the snow already removed from their cars, a task led by skills coach John McLean. A team chef had food waiting for them too.
They left, headed home briefly and arrived at TD Garden ready to go.
The Bruins scored the game’s first two goals, but couldn’t hang on in regulation as fatigue perhaps had started to set in late. Nashville scored in the final minute of the second period and the only goal of the third period to force overtime.
Three-on-three play isn’t ideal for a tired team as the players on the ice log a lot of added skating. But off the faceoff, the Bruins corralled the puck and went on the attack. Charlie McAvoy threaded a nifty pass to David Pastrnak, cutting to the net. He tipped it by Juuse Saros, 15 seconds into overtime to give the Bruins the 3-2 victory.
“Guys came back showed character and at the end of the day we’ll take all the points we can get,” Marco Sturm said after the game.
Morgan Geekie echoed his coach.
“It’s huge. When you’re faced with adversity like that it’s easy to throw in the towel and make some excuses,” said Morgan Geekie, who had a goal for the Bruins. “It speaks to the character of the group. We know nothing is going to come easy. We’re ready to battle adversity whatever that might be.”
The Bruins coach was proud of how his team handled the day.
“I was actually very happy. Nobody was complaining,” he said. “It was a little bit out of our control. Guys did a really good job. Our staff helped us with food and getting the snow off our cars to make it easier for our players to get home. It was a whole team effort.”
