The Boston Bruins had the best record in the NHL and won the Presidents Trophy when played was halted back in March. On Sunday afternoon, Boston lost their third and final round robin game by a score of 2-1 to the Washington Capitals at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto. The Bruins went 0-3 in the round robin tournament to decide the top four seeds in the East, finishing fourth and setting up a first round playoff matchup with the sixth seeded Carolina Hurricanes this coming week.
The Bruins carried play in the first period with shots on goal 6-2, but couldn’t solve Capitals goaltender Braden Holtby. Washington got a break late in the period when Boston goalie Tuuka Rask made a save and Zdeno Chara attempted to pick up the loose puck to the left of Rask, but had it knocked off his stick by T.J. Oshie who swept it into the open side of the net with 16 seconds left in the period to make it 1-0. Both teams skated through a scoreless second period, before Tom Wilson gave Washington a two goal lead with a marker 2:49 into the third period. Jake Debrusk got Boston on board at 10:30 of the third, and despite pulling Rask late the Bruins weren’t able to come up with an equalizer.
Rask made 23 saves in the loss, and both teams went 0-2 on the powerplay. Ondrej Case and David Krejci had the assists on the Debrusk goal. Holtby made 30 saves in the win, and Ilya Kovalchuk and Michal Kempny had assists. Boston begins their best of seven series with Carolina Tuesday night at 8 p.m.
Mitch Moreland had two homeruns, including a walk-off in the bottom of the ninth Sunday afternoon as the Boston Red Sox won their first series of the season with a 5-3 win over the Toronto Blue Jays at Fenway Park in the rubber game of a three game set.
A back and forth game saw Boston take the lead first when Moreland hit a solo homerun in the bottom of the second. Cavan Biggio tied it for Toronto with a solo bomb to center field in the third, before Jackie Bradley Jr. scored on a throwing error by Blue Jays pitcher Matt Shoemaker in the bottom of the inning to make it 2-1 Sox. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. tied it back up with an RBI single in the fourth, before Bo Bichette put Toronto back in front with a solo homer to right in the sixth. Rafael Devers made it 3-3 when he lost one 449 feet into the center field bleachers in the home half of the sixth. The score remained the same until Xander Bogaerts walked with two outs in the ninth, and then Moreland lifted one that found the first row of the monster seats in left to end the game off Blue Jays reliever Thomas Hatch. Moreland now has six homeruns on the season. Matt Barnes (1-1) pitched a perfect inning and won in relief for the Sox. Nathan Eovaldi allowed three runs on six hits with 10 strikeouts in 6.0 innings in the no-decision. Moreland had two of the four Boston hits on the day. Hatch (0-1) took the loss for the 5-8 Blue Jays, and Lourdes Gurriel Jr had two hits.
Boston (6-9) opens a four game series with Tampa Bay Monday night at Fenway.
