Foligno's Third-Period Tally Lifts Bruins Over Jets

BOSTON - 'Tis the season of giving after all.
And the Hockey Heavens made sure to reward the best team in the National Hockey League on Thursday night.
With the Bruins down by a pair of goals and struggling to break through against the Winnipeg Jets, the Black & Gold were buoyed by a bounce straight from the North Pole.
Nick Foligno was just looking to get the puck in deep, but as he rimmed a wrister along the glass, his dump-in attempt clanked off a stanchion behind the Winnipeg net and jetted out into the slot, completely fooling Jets goaltender Connor Hellebuyck, who had left his post to play the puck.

Fortunately for the Bruins, David Pastrnak was waiting in between the circles and blasted home his 21st goal of the season to get Boston on the board and set the tone for the club's eighth comeback victory of the season, as Jake DeBrusk followed with a power-play tally and Foligno struck for the winner midway through the third period to secure a 3-2 victory for the Bruins at TD Garden.
"Yeah, the old wily vet knew exactly how the stanchions were going to kick it out," Foligno said with a smirk. "No, that was lucky…but you know what? It got us going, so we'll take it."
The good fortune got the Bruins on the board, but Boston felt like it had begun to turn the tide much earlier. After falling behind, 2-0 - on tallies from Mark Scheifele and Jansen Harkins - by the 7:20 mark of the first period, the Bruins, while having trouble solving Hellebuyck, were starting to see their efforts pay dividends.
"I thought we were skating pretty well in the first," said Pastrnak, who extended his point streak to 10 games (8-5-13) for the sixth such stretch of his career. "We got a couple tough bounces that maybe come with a focus…maybe wasn't as focused as we should be in the beginning, but I thought we were skating well. We played pretty good, but we were down, 2-0, so we obviously knew that there had to be changes and we tried to bear down on the details and focus more on the second period."
Boston - which has now secured points in all 20 home games this season to become the 10th team in NHL history to accomplish that feat to start a season - did just that, outshooting the Jets, 16-6, during the middle frame.
And it was Pastrnak's quick strike from the slot with 7:52 left in the second period that got the Bruins on the board and shifted the momentum - and energy - within the building.
"We were relieved because the crowd got into it and I think we started to play a lot better," Bruins coach Jim Montgomery said of Pastrnak's goal. "You've got to give the Winnipeg Jets [credit], I think they did the best job that we have faced as far as a forecheck and being over top of us with really good sticks, that unfortunately we did not manage the puck well against, but I give credit to them for how determined they were at checking us."
Just under three minutes later, the Bruins knotted things up at 2 when Jake DeBrusk, who was planted at the top of the crease, deflected home Pastrnak's wrister on the power play.
"I think that bounce was huge," DeBrusk, whose tally was the 200th point of his career, said of the shift in momentum in the second. "I think that we obviously had some adjustments that we made in the intermission and tried to use them as best as we could and tried to limit their offense, or how they're going three high, and then playing our game. I think we hadn't gotten to our game yet, and once that happened, we did."

Foligno for the Win

While his rim-around, dump-in led to the bounce the Bruins needed, it was Foligno's tally midway through the third period that truly sealed the deal for Boston. After shifting up to play with Charlie Coyle and Trent Frederic, the veteran forward came through when he collected a feed from Coyle and buried a wrister by Hellebuyck glove-side to put the Bruins ahead, 3-2, with 8:52 remaining.
"It's funny, Freddy said, 'It's usually our second shift we score a goal on every time we've been put together,' and I think it was the second shift again," said Foligno. "We obviously enjoy playing together, we play a similar style: holding on to pucks, being heavy, and when I get an opportunity to play with those guys, you just want to continue to do the same things and drive play.
"I think that's the biggest thing, too. When [Montgomery] puts us out there together, it's usually for a reason - it's to try and get down low underneath the goal line and use our big bodies to get the momentum back, and luckily we were able to get that one for us."
Montgomery said that Foligno's strong play over the first three months of the season has given him options within the bottom six.
"I do like Foligno being up there with Frederic and Coyle," he said. "It gives us a real, big, heavy line that is hard to handle, and both goals they've scored are very similar. Vegas was really similar to that as well.
"But I really like him with [Tomas] Nosek and [Craig Smith] or [A.J.] Greer as well. They've been able to establish good starts for us by starting them at the beginning of games."

Swayman Settles In

After allowing two goals on the first four shots he faced, Jeremy Swayman made 23 consecutive stops to pick up the victory and improve to 7-3-1 on the season.
"I thought he made some exceptional saves," said Montgomery. "When it was 2-0, he kept it at 2-0 to give us an opportunity to get back in this game. So, I give him full credit because the first one is a guy all alone at the hash marks, and that's a tough one; that's a high-end scorer who got his 20th of the year, so he gave us an opportunity to come back and win this game, so I'm very happy with Swayman's game."
The 24-year-old has now won two straight games, allowing four goals 60 shots over that span.
"I did, absolutely," Swayman said when asked if he got stronger as the game went along. "And again, a lot of the credit goes to the guys in front of me. You focus on one shot at a time and take the positives from the play before, so that's what I wanted to focus on and, luckily, I didn't let another one in, so I was happy with that."

Wait, There's More

• With six career point streaks of 10 or more games, Pastrnak became just one of four Bruins to accomplish that feat, joining Phil Esposito (10), Bobby Orr (7), and Ray Bourque (6).
• Per NHL Stats, Pastrnak (54-46-100 in 78 games) also joined Brad Marchand (44-74-118 in 2019) and Adam Oates (36-96-132 in 1993) as the only Bruins in the past 30 years to register at least 100 regular-season points in a calendar year.
• The Bruins are now 63-20-5 in the regular season during the calendar year 2022, giving them the third-most wins in a calendar year in NHL history, behind Pittsburgh (65 in 2013) and Chicago (64 in 2013). Thirty-seven of those wins came at home, which marks the most in calendar year in NHL history (Washington: 36 in 2017 and Florida: 36 in 2021).