Here are five thoughts from the second period with the Bruins locked in a 1-1 tie with the Carolina Hurricanes after the first 20 minutes of action at PNC Arena.
1) Bruins playing with fire all through the second period: second to puck on 50/50 battles, chasing the puck all over the ice and letting up holes in the defensive zone. It eventually caught up to them when Torey Krug was caught up ice, and that opened up a Chris Terry-to-Nate Gerbe 2-on-1 that Gerbe finished under the crossbar. Bruins are 2-12-5 when they allow a goal in the final minute of the period, and they did that on the Gerbe goal. I wrote earlier today that the B’s needed to prove that yesterday’s max effort wasn’t fool’s gold, and so far they haven’t been able to do that.
2) Patrice Bergeron is 8-for-21 in the face-off circle in a rare imperfect night for the normally flawless B’s center.
3) Carl Soderberg following up yesterday’s solid effort with a dud today. He took a penalty to wipe out a B’s power play when he was too lazy to move his feet on a tripping call, and then he nearly deflected a Torey Krug D-to-D pass into the Boston net when he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was a good thing Tuukka Rask was actually tracking the puck, and stopped an accidental goal from happening.
4) Canes all around the net that period, but it’s pretty clear they’ve got some difficulty finishing off plays, or this might be a very different game.
5) All that being said Tuukka Rask is having a pretty strong game with 19 stops through two periods, with the Hurricanes leading the scoring chance race by a 10-9 margin through 40 minutes.