New York Rangers at Boston Bruins

Photo by Jared Wickerman/Getty Images

1st Period

Photo by Jared Wickerman/Getty Images

This years post-Thanksgiving match up of the Bruins hosting the Rangers started off at pretty decent clip. An early 4 on 4 situation lead to some very good chances coming off the Boston Bruins sticks, one in particular by Zdeno Chara off a deflection. The chippiness began shorty after leading both teams to start carving ruts to the sin bin. Brad Marchand, who has been slumping as of late, scored his fourth goal of the season off a one-timer from Loui Eriksson and Zdeno Chara. The excitement was short lived as Rick Nash scored his 3rd goal of the season a minute and a half later, slipping an easily stoppable puck past Tuukka Rask. A minute and a half after the Nash goal, Ryan McDonagh got another soft goal past Rask, taking the air right out of the Garden. On an afternoon that saw the return of veteran Dennis Seidenberg, the Boston Bruins defense, despite two soft goals let in by Tuukka Rask, did look especially good during the first period, especially rookie Dougie Hamilton who was moving the puck well and getting in on the offensive play.

2nd Period

It was a goal-less, defensive period that saw Boston Bruins head coach Claude Julien attempting to spark his squad by giving the lion's share of the ice time to the recently hot 3rd line of Carl Soderberg, Chris Kelly, and Reily Smith. The defensive battle led to a 5-minute major penalty for fighting taken by Bruins captain Zdeno Chara who absolutely croaked Brian Boyle. New York Rangers goaltender Henrik Lundqvist was absolutely phenomenal in the 2nd period. The Boston Bruins threw everything they could at Henrik and he simply stone-walled them.

3rd Period

The Boston Bruins came out flying in the third period leading to a quick goal by Patrice Bergeron assisted by Brad Marchand and Johnny Boychuk, tying the game at 2. With energy injected back into the building, Boston went full tilt at Lundqvist. The New York Rangers, having left the blue line wide open during the entire game, gave a puck away to David Krejci at 15:26 who fed the captain Zdeno Chara allowing him to boom a slap shot past Henrik Lundqvist to break the tie. The goal, Zdeno's 6th of the season, was also the 4th Gordie Howe hat trick in his career. Despite the Rangers getting a late power play opportunity after a Too Many Men on The Ice call, the Boston Bruins held on to defeat the New York Rangers 3 - 2.

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