It was a night of milestones for the Bruins as Milan Lucic tallied his team-leading 30th goal of the season and Zdeno Chara reached the 400 point mark for his career during a 4-1 win over the New Jersey Devils at TD Garden.
The Devils opened the scoring with 8:55 left in the first period with a power play goal from Ilya Kovalchuk with Mark Recchi off for a hooking call. New Jersey did not waste much time on the power play, finding the back of the net just 11 seconds into the man advantage. The Devils overloaded the right side of the ice, leaving Kovalchuk wide open on the left wing side of the attacking zone. Mattias Tedenby set up behind the goal line and slid the puck to Kovalchuk, who hammered a one-timer past Tim Thomas from the left circle.
Shawn Thornton evened the score at 1-1 with 4:21 to play in the opening period. Tomas Kaberle had the puck at the left point along the blue line and sent a rink-wide pass that hugged the blue line and found Dennis Seidenberg at the right point. Seidenberg got a quick shot off that was deflected out of mid-air by Shawn Thornton for his 9th goal of the season.
Zdeno Chara scored the Bruins' first power play goal in what seemed like a decade to take a 2-1 lead at 8:17 of the second period. Milan Lucic had the puck on the right wing half wall and slid the puck across the ice through a seam in the Devils' penalty kill to Zdeno Chara, who was driving to the net on the back door. Chara fired a quick shot that got past Martin Brodeur for Chara's 400th NHL point and the Bruins first 5 on 4 goal since February 18th.
Milan Lucic's 30th goal of the season gave the Bruins an insurance goal and a 2-goal lead with 3:47 left in the third period. Patrice Bergeron carried the puck behind the goal line and fed a pass out front to Lucic at the left inside hashmarks where he snapped off a quick one-timer that beat Martin Brodeur up high on the nearside.
Mark Recchi added an empty net tally with 39.6 seconds left in the game to seal the win for the Bruins.
Notes:
- Zdeno Chara had a 3-point game (1-2-3). Tomas Kaberle (2 assists), Milan Lucic (1-1-2), and Patrice Begeron (2 assists) all had 2-point nights.
- Tim Thomas stopped 30 pucks to help the B's get a win tonight.
- Daniel Paille and Steven Kampfer were the healthy scratches.
- Brad Marchand returned from his 2-game suspension. He finished the night +1 in 16:03 of ice time.
- Julien is starting to show some confidence in Tyler Seguin. The kid saw 3:05 of power play time tonight.
- The Bruins will welcome the Montreal Canadiens to TD Garden on Thursday night for a much-anticipated showdown with the hated Habs.
- For more on tonight's game from the Garden State, check out In Lou We Trust.