Boston Bruins

By Fluto Shinzawa, Globe Staff NEW YORK ? Good morning from Madison Square Garden, where the Bruins will look to sweep the Rangers tonight. Game 5 is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. on Saturday at TD Garden, but the Bruins have...

Just the Facts Game Time: 7:00 PM, Madison Square Garden, New York, NY. TV Broadcast: CNBC, TSN, RDS. Radio Broadcast: 98.5 The Sports Hub. Record: Bruins 3, Rangers 0. The Other Side's SB Nation Site: Blueshirt Banter Get Tickets here: Boston Bruins Tickets Rangers projected lines Hagelin - Stepan - Callahan Zuccarello - Brassard - Nash Dorsett - Boyle - Pyatt Kreider - Richards - Asham Girardi - McDonaghStralman - Del ZottoMoore - Eminger Lundqvist Bruins projected lines: Lucic - Krejci - Horton Marchand - Bergeron - JagrPeverley - Kelly - SeguinPaille - Campbell - Thornton Chara - SeidenbergKrug - McQuaidBartkowski - Boychuk Rask Preview: So Dennis Seidenberg has said he's optimistic about a return for game 4. There's no indication that he WON'T play, so as of now, we're assuming he's going to. Cool. Bench Dougie, give the other kids more ice time, and let's do this thing. After a grind-it-out game three in which two goals were scored with the Merlot line on ice, here's hoping for a return to game two-esque action, with actual goals scored by the lines that are supposed to be scoring them. While we're at it, let's gush about the kid defensemen, too -- and not Dougie, either. Matt Bartkowski and Torey Krug played 19:12 and 18:08 respectively in game three; each even had a small amount of time on the PK. No PP time, as there were no power plays (thanks, MSG) but watching Krug on the power play tonight should be excellent should the Bruins get to go on the man advantage at all. Not talking too much about the fact that this is a close-out game because it makes me nervous as hell. Call it a cross between 2010 and 2011. Remember how we all felt after game 3 in 2011? Yeah. Basically that.

Just the Facts Game Time: 7:00 PM, Madison Square Garden, New York, NY. TV Broadcast: CNBC, TSN, RDS. Radio Broadcast: 98.5 The Sports Hub. Record: Bruins 3, Rangers 0. The Other Side's SB Nation Site: Blueshirt Banter Get Tickets here: Boston Bruins Tickets Rangers projected lines Hagelin - Stepan - Callahan Zuccarello - Brassard - Nash Dorsett - Boyle - Pyatt Kreider - Richards - Asham Girardi - McDonaghStralman - Del ZottoMoore - Eminger Lundqvist Bruins projected lines: Lucic - Krejci - Horton Marchand - Bergeron - JagrPeverley - Kelly - SeguinPaille - Campbell - Thornton Chara - SeidenbergKrug - McQuaidBartkowski - Boychuk Rask Preview: So Dennis Seidenberg has said he's optimistic about a return for game 4. There's no indication that he WON'T play, so as of now, we're assuming he's going to. Cool. Bench Dougie, give the other kids more ice time, and let's do this thing. After a grind-it-out game three in which two goals were scored with the Merlot line on ice, here's hoping for a return to game two-esque action, with actual goals scored by the lines that are supposed to be scoring them. While we're at it, let's gush about the kid defensemen, too -- and not Dougie, either. Matt Bartkowski and Torey Krug played 19:12 and 18:08 respectively in game three; each even had a small amount of time on the PK. No PP time, as there were no power plays (thanks, MSG) but watching Krug on the power play tonight should be excellent should the Bruins get to go on the man advantage at all. Not talking too much about the fact that this is a close-out game because it makes me nervous as hell. Call it a cross between 2010 and 2011. Remember how we all felt after game 3 in 2011? Yeah. Basically that.

As you probably know, Bruins defenseman Dennis Seidenberg has been out of action since Game 7 against the Maple Leafs. Luckily for him, the B’s have been just fine in Seidenberg’s absence, and he admits that it makes it easier to take an additional day to get healthy knowing that your teammates are taking care of business. Even though he’s not on the ice, Seidenberg has a pretty good pulse of the team, and right now he says the Bruins are playing with confidence, and that’s a recipe for success. Check out everything Seidenberg told NESN Daily‘s Naoko Funayama at Bruins practice on Wednesday in the video below.

Don't ask how we found this... ok, go ahead and ask. But we're pretty sure this is Patrice Bergeron modeling as a pirate for a trash romance novel. First a Selke nomination and now a Golden Heart Award Finalist. What a year Bergy is having.

8 a.m. ET: The Bruins will be in a familiar position when the puck drops for Game 4 at Madison Square Garden, and they can call on examples of both the right way and the wrong way to handle the situation. The B’s will take on the Rangers on Thursday night, and they’ll have a chance to end the Rangers’ season. Boston enters Game 4 holding the 3-0 series lead after the 2-1 win over the Blueshirts on Tuesday night. Only a few teams have blown a 3-0 series lead, including this Bruins team, under Claude Julien, just three years ago against the Flyers. Of course, the Bruins bounced back a year later to win the Stanley Cup, and sweeping the Flyers in the process. Boston got another reminder of how important it is to close a series in the first round of this year’s playoffs, too. Toronto pushed the B’s to the brink after the Bruins had a 3-1 series lead before hanging on to win the series with a Game 7 overtime win. So if anyone knows the importance of closing things out with a big series lead, it should be the Bruins. The Rangers aren’t necessarily inspiring any confidence right now, either. New York has been outplayed in all three games of the series, and even with Henrik Lundqvist standing on his head in Game 3, it just wasn’t quite enough. Making matters worse for John Tortorella’s bunch is that they’re a little banged up following a physical, bloody Game 3. Both defenseman Anton Stralman and forward Chris Kreider both left games with injuries Tuesday night that will bear keeping an eye on in Game 4. Other than that, Game 4 will be all about which team is the more desperate team. The Rangers’ desperation is obvious. The Bruins, meanwhile, would probably love nothing more than to end the series now and get some rest in advance of the Eastern Conference finals. Puck drop for Game 4 is set for just after 7:30 in New York.

So I'm not sure how many of you have been paying attention to the Memorial Cup (the Canadian Junior Hockey Championship) but the round-robin games are over and the field is set for the playoffs. These aren't even on TV, which is lame as hell. They were last year, great job expanding your coverage NHL network, you assholes. Anyways, tonight the host team the Saskatoon Blades play the London Knights. Tomorrow, the winner of that game plays Seth Jones and the Portland Winterhawks. Sunday, the winner of that game plays the Halifax Mooseheads for the Memorial Cup. There aren't many Bruins prospects playing in this tournament, but nobody wants to talk about what went down in Providence last night so we're talking about this. Or tonight's game, whatever. Your choice. It's a morning skate. Work with the space. Bemoan the Pens beating Ottawa by about a billion to 3 and Alfie giving a juicy quote. Alfie can't catch a break. "I guarantee we'll win the cup" is met with laughter, and now "I don't know if we can beat them, they have too much depth" is met with the same. If Ottawa was slightly more likable, I might feel bad for him. But screw that. We've taken what we can from them. But I digress. What's on tap?

Providence, RI--- Wednesday night at the Dunkin Donuts Center, the Providence Bruins were on the wrong end of AHL history. For the first time ever, a lower seed won the seventh game to win a series after falling behind three-games-to-zero. "It hurts. We battled hard all year. To go up three-nothing, and then for them to come back and win four in a row, it's a tough pill to swallow," said Providence captain Trent Whitfield. Wilkes-Barre/Scranton completed its series comeback thanks to a four-goal second period outburst. The Penguins added a goal late in the third period to take the decisive game, 5-0. On the other side, Penguins coach John Hynes was happy to talk about the historical significance of the feat his team pulled off. "The fact we came back from 0-3 and won game seven on the road is special. Anytime you can make history as a player or a team is special because that is why we all play sports. One of the most important things we do is leave a legacy and this team was able to do that so far," said Hynes. Chad Kolarik started the scoring with a power play goal at the 4:44 mark of the second period. After taking a feed from former Boston College defenseman Brian Dumoulin, Kolarik's first shot was blocked, but he followed the puck to the net and scored from the left side for his fifth of the playoffs. Holding onto a 1-0 lead, Wilkes-Barre scored three goals on three consecutive shots in a span of 4:11 to blow the game wide open and crush the hearts of the home fans. Warren Peters gave the Penguins a 2-0 lead at the 13:04 mark when he tipped a Joey Mormina wrist shot from the left point. Peters is now 5-0 on his AHL career in game sevens. Adam Payerl made it 3-0 Penguins when he converted on a quick pass from Chris Collins following a misplayed puck by Providence goaltender Niklas Svedberg. The AHL's top goaltender during the regular season was chased from the game following the second period. Zach Sill gave the Penguins a commanding four-goal lead when he fired home a pass from Collins with 2:45 to play in the second. Dominik Uher was credited with the secondary assist. In the third period, Trevor Smith scored streaking down the left side with 4:35 to play in the game. Kolarik and Derek Nesbitt picked up the two helpers. The score was the fourth goal of the playoffs for Smith, the former UNH forward. Hynes' decision to switch goaltenders prior to the third game ended up being a brilliant move. Brad Thiessen took the loss in Game 3, but was a huge factor in Wilkes-Barre winning four consecutive games to take the series. After falling behind two-games-to-zero in the first round and winning three in a row over Hershey to make the second round, Providence watched as Wilkes-Barre returned the favor. The slide can be attributed to hot goaltending by Thiessen, but also to three key defensemen missing for the Bruins. Zach Trotman was injured and Torey Krug and Matt Bartkowski were called up to the parent club in Boston. On the ice, the team lacked discipline and made numerous mental mistakes. With Krug bringing his offensive exploits to Boston, Providence lost its way on the power play. The Bruins went powerless on the man advantage, not scoring a power play goal since the second game of the series. "That's just an excuse [missing the three defensemen]. I mean they definitely would have helped us. They have a lot of experience and were back there most of the year for us. Just the familiarity with them on the power play, but at the end of the day we had plenty of guys in [the locker room] to get the job done," said Whitfield. "You got to put it on us. We got to finish the plays and we didn't. It wasn't our best. We all know that," said Providence coach Bruce Cassidy. Wilkes-Barre/Scranton advances to the Eastern Conference Finals where it will take on the Syracuse Crunch starting Saturday night at the Onecenter War Memorial Rink in Syracuse.

NEW YORK — The Bruins propped up an accommodating collection of players to speak with the media following yesterday’s optional skate at Madison Square Garden, but it was a leftover quote from late Tuesday night, delivered by Game 3 hero Johnny Boychuk, that says it all.

NEW YORK — After 10 games in the 2011 Stanley Cup playoffs, Bruins goaltender Tim Thomas was 7-3, with a 2.12 goals-against average and .935 save percentage. He was the talk of the postseason, already proclaimed not just the best goalie in the NHL but the best player, period.After 10 games in the 2013 playoffs, Bruins netminder Tuukka Rask is 7-3, with a 2.19 GAA and .930 save percentage. Most people are talking about how good Henrik Lundqvist is.