GOLD STAR: Michael Raffl – The Flyers forward scored a pair of goals including the game-winner on a shorthanded strike when he and Jori Lehtera teamed to beat Charlie McAvoy down to the other end of the ice for a 50/50 puck. Raffl then added an empty net goal in the final two minutes of the game to ice things for the Flyers as things were really falling apart for the Bruins in the final 20 minutes of the final exhibition game. Raffl finished with two goals and a plus-2 rating in 14:51 of ice time with two shots on net, two takeaways and two blocked shots along with a hit, in a pretty strong final tune-up for the regular season.
BLACK EYE: With a chance to secure a spot on the second line with David Krejci and Jake DeBrusk, Danton Heinen did not come to play in the final exhibition game tune-up of training camp. Heinen finished with a minus-3 rating, had zero shots on net in 16:10 of ice time. Heinen had three of his shot attempts blocked and a giveaway while not really playing with the two-way tenacity or playmaking ability that’s usually a part of his game when he’s at his best. He wasn’t alone, however, as Charlie McAvoy was equally bad after getting beaten on the shorthanded goal that turned into the game-winner for the Flyers.
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TURNING POINT: We’ve already mentioned it a couple of times, so it seems pretty clear that Boston allowing a shorthanded goal off the offensive zone face-off was really a point of no return in them looking for a win. McAvoy was beaten to a cleared puck by Jori Lehtera deep in the Bruins' zone, and that turned into a quality offensive chance for Michael Raffl that he was able to score on. The goal gave the Flyers a 2-1 lead in the third period, and they were able to score two more unanswered goals to seal the win after that. As pivotal plays go in preseason games, this one was pretty bad for the Black and Gold, and uncharacteristically bad for McAvoy.
HONORABLE MENTION: Ryan Donato scored a third period goal to get the Bruins into the game offensively and did it by redirecting a deep David Pastrnak wrist shot past Brian Elliot for the B’s score. It was another piece of preseason production for the Bruins rookie, and it was a response after Bruce Cassidy had put Donato with Krejci and DeBrusk to give him a bit of a look on that line as well. Donato finished with a goal, three shot attempts, a hit, a takeaway and a blocked shot in 17:32 of ice time while finishing the preseason much stronger than Heinen did. It wasn’t perfect, but Donato was on the score sheet and didn’t finish in the minus, and that will portend good things if he can do that during the regular season.
BY THE NUMBERS: -3 – the plus/minus number for Charlie McAvoy, who did not have a good game at all for the Bruins in his final tune-up for the regular season.
Boston Bruins
QUOTE TO NOTE: “Our respect for the game. That means puck management, details, stopping and starting on pucks. Some of that, you allow your veteran guys to play through in hope that their habits will come back to them quickly, but we have some guys that are second-year players that are struggling with that right now. They need to be reminded that 80-100 games under your belt is good, a good building block, but as Zee [Zdeno Chara] pointed out you want to continue to establish yourself as a true NHLer.” -- Bruce Cassidy, on what needs to be tightened up by the Bruins after their final preseason game.