It must be a new year if a coach's challenge finally went the Bruins' way

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BOSTON – It’s a new year for the Boston Bruins, so it’s probably appropriate that the video replay is finally working in their favor.

The Bruins finally challenged a play with the coach’s challenge for the first time this season in and won it in Boston’s 2-1 overtime loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets at TD Garden. It was a key point in the game, too, for the Black and Gold as Sean Kuraly coughed up a puck in front of the Boston net on the very first shift of the game, and the ensuing scramble around the net led to Gustav Nyquist scoring an apparent early goal for the Blue Jackets.

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Minutes later it was overturned after a video review showed “that the actions of Columbus’ Boone Jenner impaired Boston’s goaltender Tuukka Rask ability to play his position in the crease prior to Gustav Nyquist’s goal. It was certainly a big break for the Bruins bench, who were joking about finally getting a challenge to go their way as they waited for the announced outcome from the refereeing crew.

“We actually talked about it on the bench, wondering if we were going to get the call or not,” said Torey Krug. “It’s nice to get it. Who knows if it starts that way you don’t really know what road the game is going to go down? I like to think we have a group that would respond appropriately, but you never know.”

The decision was made in accordance with Rule 69.3 which states, in part, “If an attacking player initiates contact with a goalkeeper, incidental or otherwise, while the goalkeeper is in his goal crease, and a goal is scored, the goal will be disallowed.”

Who knows how the game might have rolled out if a Blue Jackets goal scored just seconds after puck drop had counted for Columbus? But the overturned goal clearly played a role in the B’s at least getting a point against the Blue Jackets and finally allowed the B’s to be on the right side of the coach’s challenge after losing an NHL-high five goals on six challenges made against them in the first three months of the 2019-20 season.

“Goalie Bob [Essensa] felt Tuukka [Rask] was interfered with. We would have challenged that whether we were playing Columbus or Edmonton,” said Bruce Cassidy. “It was more about we felt he had interfered with his stick and his body position, it wasn’t pushed in. That’s obviously the way he saw it.”

Given the law of averages, the Bruins should be in line for a few more video reviews going their way in the second half of the season after the coach’s challenge cost them a whopping five goals in the first half of the season. 

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