It’s been two years since Boston faced Tampa Bay in the postseason, and now the Bruins will get to see how they match up with the Lightning in a second round playoff series.
The Columbus Blue Jackets didn’t have enough in them this year to do the Boston Bruins and the rest of the NHL another major favor. One year after the Blue Jackets eliminated the top-seeded Tampa Bay Lightning in the first round, the Lightning got their revenge with a five-game series victory this year. Now we’ll finally get to see a playoff series two years in the making between the Bruins, the Presidents’ Trophy winners in the regular season who are now the fourth seed because of their 0-3-0 performance in round-robin play, and the second-seeded Lightning, who eliminated Boston in five games in 2018. The series begins Sunday night. The Bruins have waited for revenge ever since that series two years ago, but Columbus altered Boston’s path to the 2019 Cup final. Boston lost three out of four games to Tampa Bay in the long-ago regular season, including a 5-3 Lightning victory that featured 94 penalty minutes. Yes, the Boston-Tampa Bay rivalry is alive and well, especially since the Lightning added some grit at the NHL trade deadline. Boston’s victory over Carolina was a referendum on what they said during round-robin play about using their three games (all losses) to get their legs under them. They backed that up against the Hurricanes. Now the next best-of-seven series will a referendum on some specific elements of their roster. Let’s take a look: It took the 43-year-old a little longer than many of his teammates to get into a rhythm against the Hurricanes and he was on the ice for more scoring chances and high-danger scoring chances against than one would expect.
