The Boston Bruins rattled off three goals inside the final four minutes of the third period and beat the visiting New York Rangers 3-0 in the season opener for both teams on Tuesday night.
Fraser Minten netted the game-winner with 3:46 remaining, gathering Mason Lohrei’s pass off a neutral-zone takeaway and firing a laser from the slot past New York goaltender Igor Shesterkin (20 saves). He was the lone Bruin to finish with multiple points.
JJ Peterka and Mark Kastelic also lit the lamp, while Jeremy Swayman pitched a 24-save shutout to lift Boston to its 11th consecutive home-opening win, which matches the NHL record.
Swayman made 10 third-period stops.
Only 52 seconds after Minten’s deciding tally, at 17:06, Peterka excited the home crowd in his Boston debut by taking an Elias Lindholm feed and deking around defender Braden Schneider to score five-hole in tight.
Kastelic put an exclamation point on the win with an empty-netter at 17:29.
New York was shut out in Mike Sullivan’s 1,000th game as an NHL head coach.
A scoreless first period started with Pavel Zacha lasering a shot off Shesterkin’s mask in the opening minute. At the other end, one of Swayman’s best stops came on Oliver Bjorkstrand’s 2-on-1 with Marcus Pettersson minutes later.
Each team went 0-for-1 on the power play in the first. Shesterkin bailed out his team for committing eight giveaways.
The Bruins could not bury multiple point-blank chances in the second, with a lonely Geekie ringing the left post inside the opening five minutes. Shesterkin thwarted Zacha’s breakaway less than a minute later and also turned aside Minten and David Pastrnak in transition.
New York flew out of the gates in the third, forcing Swayman to save Mika Zibanejad’s one-timer off an offensive zone faceoff win. The Boston netminder stood tall just before the halfway mark of the period, stopping Pavel Dorofeyev’s chance in alone after defenseman Connor Clifton broke his stick at the opposite blue line.
–Field Level Media
