Stanley Cup Final Game 1 Live Blog: Bruins vs. Blues

Welcome to Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final between the Boston Bruins and St. Louis Blues. NHL.com Editor-in-Chief Bill Price was inside TD Garden to chronicle the sights, sounds and all the action from the Bruins' 4-2 win on Monday.

RELATED: [Complete Stanley Cup Final coverage]

10:55 p.m. ET

Game 1 of the Cup Final is in the books. An empty-net goal from Brad Marchand at 18:11 capped the scoring, and though the Bruins won 4-2, it wasn't that close after the first minute of the second period.
Boston dominated the Blues over the final 40 minutes, outshooting St. Louis 30-12.
The Blues, who have been a resilient bunch this season and postseason, will need to bounce back in Game 2. More importantly, they need to find a way to generate more scoring chances.
It's hard enough to defeat Tuukka Rask when you are peppering the net, but when you can't get the puck on net, it's nearly impossible with the way the Boston goalie has played.
The NHL.com crew is heading to the dressing rooms to get the story from each side. You can follow

for all the coverage of Game 1.
Thanks for riding along in Game 1. We'll be back with the live blog for Game 2 on Wednesday.

10:50 p.m. ET

We have another celebrity sighting in the house: Patriots owner Robert Kraft was just shown on the big screen. Naturally, Boston fans, who are looking for their third pro sports title in the past seven months, gave him a big cheer.
Heck, they might cheer Peyton Manning at this point, things are going so well for the Bruins, who are just under eight minutes away from taking a 1-0 lead in the Cup Final.
The Blues not only can't generate any shots on goal, they have now taken five penalties, the latest an interference call from Sammy Blais with 6:32 left in the game.
The Blues, who have three shots this period, can't afford to fall behind by two goals.

10:45 p.m. ET

The Bruins not only killed off the power play, but Torey Krug just delivered a punishing hit to Blues forward Robert Thomas. This after Krug was tied up in front of his own goal with David Perron of the Blues.
As if the crowd needed any more reason to yell, Krug, who was helmetless at the time, gave it to them. We are under 10 minutes to play and the Bruins are starting to impose their will on the Blues.
Still, it's a one-goal game at the moment, but the Blues have three shots on goal in the first 11 minutes of it, two of them coming on their most recent power play.

10:30 p.m. ET

It seemed inevitable that the Bruins would score and they just did, making it a 3-2 game with 14:39 left.
They are thoroughly outplaying the Blues since the first minute of the second period, outshooting them 24-3 since that point, and more importantly outscoring them 3-0. Forward Sean Kuraly scored the goal on assists from Noel Acciari and Zdeno Chara.

The Blues, perhaps for the first time this postseason, look overmatched. Even Binnington, who has kept St. Louis in the game, doesn't look as sharp, even on saves he's making.
Perhaps it was the rust of the 10 days off causing the Bruins to get off to a slow start, but they are rolling now.
However, David Krejci just took a penalty, so the Blues, who have four shots on goal since the end of the first period, will go on their second power play with a chance to tie it up.

10:23 p.m. ET

The third period of what has been an entertaining opener to the 2019 Stanley Cup Final is underway.
TD Garden, which was quiet when Vladimir Tarasenko gave the Blues a 2-0 lead one minute into the second period, is rocking, but it's more of a nervous feeling now with perhaps one goal for either team deciding the opener.
The Blues need to get their offense going. They didn't have a shot on the goal for the last 8:16 of the second period and had three shots the entire period. Tuukka Rask must feel like he's back on his 10-day break.
Blues rookie Jordan Binnington has played well with Boston carrying the play since the Tarasenko goal.
You wonder how much more he can keep it up with the Bruins constantly swarming the net.

10 p.m. ET

Wow. What a 20 minutes of hockey that was. The Bruins appeared to be in trouble when Vladimir Tarasenko scored one minute into the second period to give the Blues a 2-0 lead, but the Bruins have dominated since then, tying the game heading to the third period.
The Bruins outshot the Blues 18-3 in the second, and that doesn't include Brad Marchand hitting the post with about 1:30 left in the period.
The Bruins are clearly rolling, but the Blues were able to get out of the period tied 2-2 and can now regroup in the dressing room.
Certainly a different vibe in here now with 20 minutes of regulation to go.

9:55 p.m. ET

The wrestling theme is taking over with the latest pump-up video to be shown in the arena featuring clips of Ric Flair, Hulk Hogan, the Rock, Vince McMahon, and "Stone Cold" Steve Austin.
The crowd has certainly responded as this place is ready to erupt if the Bruins score again.
It will be interesting to see how the Blues respond in a hostile building facing their first adversity of the night.
They need, at the very least, to take some momentum back as the Bruins seem to have shaken off the rust from the 10 days without a game, peppering Jordan Binnington and outshooting the Blues 24-11 in the game and 16-3 in the second period with 3:20 left.

9:46 p.m. ET

Lil Nas X, who played the pregame concert at City Hall, is in the house with his very own Lil Nas X Bruins jersey.
Other celebs in the house include filmmaker Bobby Farrelly of "There's Something About Mary" fame, and singer Chase Rice, who was shown on the videoboard chugging a can of Coors Light.
To get the crowd pumped up the Bruins showed a video of John Belushi's famous speech from "Animal House" - that never gets old - and then played the opening seconds of Guns N' Roses "Welcome to the Jungle."
It worked and the Bruins responded with a Charlie McAvoy power-play goal at 7:19 to tie the game at 2-2.
This place is nuts again, and to keep with the wrestling theme, the crowd just let out a loud Ric Flair 'woo.'

9:40 p.m. ET

The Bruins are now 0-for-3 on the power play after the Blues killed off the Edmundson high-sticking on David Backes. Boston's power play was 7-for-15 in the sweep of the Carolina Hurricanes in the conference final and was 17-for-50 (34 percent) in playoffs coming in to tonight.
As for the crowd, it appears we have a second Randy Savage impersonator, who happened to be sitting with a fan dressed like Hulk Hogan.
These sightings may cause NHL.com columnist Dave Stubbs to break out some of his Andre the Giant stories from his days as a wresting referee.
Back to the hockey, the Bruins are back in the game, and have outshot St. Louis 7-2 over the first half of the second period but trail 2-1 and need to get their power play going.

9:30 p.m. ET

There are plenty of great looks in the crowd with one fan dressed up as wrestler Randy "Macho Man" Savage. I believe he also had a Slim Jim with him at one point.
The intensity in the crowd appears to be back after the Connor Clifton goal that made it 2-1 at 2:16 of the second period.

Looking around the crowd, there doesn't appear to be much blue anywhere, maybe a few St. Louis fans scattered about, but as you would expect it's a sea of gold and yellow.
We had our first sign of - as Doc Emrick would say - a snarl with Blues defenseman Joel Edmundson taking a high-sticking penalty against David Backes. The Bruins are now on the power play looking to tie the game up and swing the momentum in their favor.

9:22 p.m. ET

The second period has begun and it's not exactly what the Bruins were hoping for.
Vladimir Tarasenko of the Blues scored one minute into the second to give St. Louis a 2-0 lead.

The mood in here has certainly changed since the puck dropped an hour or so ago.
What the Bruins and their fans need is a jolt and it came in the form of a goal by defenseman Connor Clifton 1:16 after Tarasenko scored.
This place is now alive again.

9:05 p.m. ET

One period of the 2019 Stanley Cup Final is in the book and the Blues lead 1-0.
Blues goalie Jordan Binnington passed some early tests to keep the Bruins off the board and the Blues took advantage of a loose puck in the Bruins zone for the game's only goal to this point.

The TD Garden crowd is certainly not as amped up as it was to start the game, which is understandable. As a matter of fact, it's somewhat quiet in here during the first intermission.
Each team had eight shots on goal in the period and the Blues outhit the Bruins 12-9. Another storyline coming into the game was special teams and thus far the penalty killing has won the day, with the Blues killing off two penalties and the Bruins killing off one.
The best chance for the Bruins on their first power play came when Marcus Johansson split two defenseman and hit the post with his shot.

The Blues are likely the toughest team the Bruins will face in this season's playoffs, and that has proven to be the case thus far.
It will be interesting to see if the Bruins can get an offensive flow going to start the second.

8:50 p.m. ET

One of themes coming into the Cup Final was how the Blues and Bruins were mirror images of each other and that is playing out so far in Game 1.
With 6:45 left in the first period, the Blues have seven shots on goal to the Bruins five. The Bruins have nine hits to the Blues seven. Each team has a 50 percent face-off win percentage and two giveaways. The Bruins have four blocks.
It's been a tight game, as expected with the Schenn goal the only difference, but it's a big difference with the Blues up 1-0.
The Blues had the power-play advantage, but now the Bruins are going to the man-advantage with David Perron taking a tripping penalty at 6:45.

8:45 p.m. ET

Any questions about Blues rookie goalie Jordan Binnington being ready for the big stage have been answered to this point. He has been sharp, keeping the Bruins off the board.
The Blues meanwhile, scored on their fourth shot on goal against Rask, with Brayden Schenn picking up a loose puck in front and beating the Bruins goalie with a wrist shot to the blocker side at 7:23 of the first.
The goal has quieted the crowd a bit, but the fans are trying to get back into it with a "Let's Go Bruins" chant.
Still, Schenn's third goal of the playoffs has certainly taken some air out of TD Garden.

8:40 p.m. ET

The rust doesn't seem to have impacted the Bruins, who have come out flying.
Forward David Pastrnak nearly scored 35 seconds into the game, but Blues goalie Jordan Binnington made the stop on a wide-open shot -- sort of. The puck trickled behind Binnington, but no Bruins player was able to pounce on it.
About two minutes later, Binnington was able to stop Jake DeBrusk on a partial breakaway.
The Blues went on the power play at 3:37 of the first after Sean Kuraly took a tripping penalty, causing a brief break in the noise, but Boston was able to kill the penalty, allowing just one shot during the man-advantage.

8:20 p.m. ET

The 10 days between games for the Bruins has not sapped any enthusiasm out of this Boston crowd, which is loud and ready for the first Stanley Cup Final game at TD Garden since 2013.
This morning, each seat in TD Garden had a white wrist band on it. Now that the fans are wearing them, there is an in-house lightshow.

A pregame video showing the Bobby Orr goal that clinched the 1970 Cup Final against the Blues has gotten the crowed even more ramped up, as well as eight members of the 2011 Cup championship team who were introduced as honorary banner captains.
Michael Ryder, Daniel Paille, Gregory Campbell, Shawn Thornton, Chris Kelly, Andrew Ference, Dennis Seidenberg and Rich Peverley are in the house.
This place is ready for hockey.

8 p.m. ET

The crowd that had packed the streets outside TD Garden is slowly making its way inside. Not surprisingly the pregame music selection in the arena did not include Laura Branigan's "Gloria," which has become the Blues official victory song.
The playlist featured some oldies before the Bruins took the ice for warmups, then it went in another direction.
Here is the playlist that started around 7:15:

The Bruins have now taken the ice for warmups and I've pulled out the Shazam app for their mix.

7:20 p.m. ET

We are an hour or so from puck drop and the party is in full swing here in Boston.

Fans in Bruins jerseys were out in full force on a beautiful day in Boston, lining the streets, packing the bars and restaurants near the arena a few hours before the game started. The city, which is looking for its third professional sports championship since the Red Sox won the World Series seven months ago Tuesday, is buzzing.
A few blocks from the TD Garden, Lil Nas X and Chase Rice headlined the Stanley Cup Final Party at City Hall.

The big theme in Boston for the past few days has been the 10 days between games the Bruins have had since winning the Eastern Conference Final. Will they be sharp, will goalie Tuukka Rask continue his dominance from the sweep of the Carolina Hurricanes? We may find out early in the game.
David Perron is the only member of the Blues to have previously played in a Cup Final, but they insist their lack of experience won't be a factor.