Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Nine in a row and counting


Pending an act of the Playoff Gods, the Boston Bruins will only have to deal with the big bad Habs for two more times until September’s pre season for 2008-09 rolls around.

The latest match up between the original six rivals went much the way the last eight have gone, with the Habs dominating the Bruins and sending them back to their dressing room with a serious inferiority complex.

Tom Kostopoulos got the night’s events underway just fourteen seconds into the first period and from that point on and for seven more goals later the Canadiens never seemed to have to look back.

The Bruins starting goaltending Alex Auld was replaced in the second period after surrendering his three goals on seven shots, giving way to Tim Thomas who would quickly find out that his own personal demons with the Habs would continue on the night, as five more Canadien goals went into the Bruin net before the game came to an end.

The Bruins gained two goals back but for the most part had a fair amount of trouble getting shots by Cristobal Huet, who turned aside 29 of the 31 attempts on the night.

At times the play was rather chippy as has been the case of late whenever these two teams get together, with a few main event scraps thrown in to put a physical feel to the on ice thumping that the Bruins suffered.

Fortunately for Boston the misery of Montreal is almost finished for the year, in a strange quirk of scheduling no other games are scheduled between the teams until the end ofMarch when the play a home and home series on the 20th and 22nd. Those two games provide the Bruins with two final opportunities to reverse their fortunes of late, unless of course through some alignment of stars the two teams should meet in the playoffs.

Which if the recent streak is any indication would be a very short, very physical, very lopsided and at the moment very unlikely series.

CBC Sports--Canadiens win 9th straight over Bruins
Montreal Gazette--Balanced Habs attack bullies Bruins
Boston Globe--In Montreal, Bruins are behind the 8-ball

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