27-of-28 points. The Bruins have earned one point less than what's possible in the last thirteen games, starting off the month of December on the right foot with a 4-1 sweep of the Toronto Maple Leafs.
And for once, it wasn't Tyler Seguin's name that was broadcasted over the loud speakers.
The first line of David Krejci, Milan Lucic and Nathan Horton started the scoring again for the Bruins, putting up six points total for the night--two from each forward.
The recently extended Czech, Krejci put the Bruins on the board first in the second period, burying a tic-tac-toe pass from Horton. Krejci was crashing the net from the right side and shot far side as soon as he saw James Reimer challenging him in front.
The Leafs answered almost immediately with a goal from one of the only members of that team that has seemed to figure out the Bruins, Mikhail Grabovski.
Before the period ended, the Black and Gold took the lead once again with a perfectly threaded pass from Rich Peverley to a waiting Chris Kelly. Peverley was being challenged in the right circle and found Kelly crashing the back side, put the puck through the crease and off Kelly's stick.
That was just enough to put the Bruins on top and keep them there for the rest of the game. However, assurance goals came once again from Johnny Boychuk in the third period, who sent a rocket from the right point and into the back of the net, and Horton's wrister from the slot that sealed the deal.
"The one thing we talked about was 'make sure we don’t sit on the lead,'" head coach Claude Julien said. "I don’t want our guys going into the third period and playing on their heels and just trying to protect the lead and sitting back. You create the lead--you extend the lead--before you even think about protecting the lead. So we needed to get the next goal—we had to work hard at that and then make sure that we worked even harder to not let them get that next goal.
"Our guys responded well, we defended well, but we made sure we made some adjustments after the second period--too many turnovers around the offensive blue-line for our liking and we had to get pucks in deeper and win those races and spend more time in their end."
And they did. The spent a lot of time in their end.
Midway through the third period, the Bruins had a stint of what seemed like minutes of time just dominating in the Leafs zone. Though they weren't able to score during that shift, they made sure that Toronto knew that was the level of competition they would have to reach to win.
"Yeah, it kind of seemed like a moment where we were kind of silently saying 'try and hang with us,'" Bruins defenseman Joe Corvo said. "Kind of like a challenge and we were out there, you notice they're tired and it's kind of like a shark seeing blood in the water and we tried to take advantage of it and try and help keep them pinned in the zone. And those are fun moments for me, it's fun to be involved in that stuff and be involved in offense."
Corvo had differing amounts of fun in the game as well. With just over five minutes left to play in the game, up 4-1, Corvo dropped his gloves for the first time in his 592-game NHL career against Joey Crabb. Though it seemed like it ended in a draw, Corvo said that it kind of felt almost like his Bruins initiation moment, knowing what the history of the Bruins is.
"I figured, yeah, after the first game when I was driving out of the parking lot and I was signing some autographs and somebody came up to the window and they're like just fight one time and they'll love you here," Corvo said. "So I figured that it was going to happen at some point."
The Bruins will head off to Pittsburgh on Monday where they will play the number one team in the Eastern Conference: the Penguins. They hope to carry this momentum against a team that has its superstar back in the lineup and seemingly not missing a beat.
" Like I said, we want to get up there in the standings," Krejci said. "And this is a game for first place so it’s going to be a big one."