Talking Points: Line switches help Bruins earn win

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GOLD STAR: Joonas Kemppainen had his best game as a member of the Bruins, scoring his first NHL goal and notching the primary assist on the insurance marker in the third period. It was a line scramble from Claude Julien that sparked the offense when he moved Ryan Spooner onto the wing with Kemppainen, and that helped get good production from both players in a spot where the Bruins really needed it. Kemppainen won a puck battle with a hard fore-check on the first goal, and then crashed the net for a rebound after Ryan Spooner’s shot was blocked from the slot area. Then he did the same thing along the side board in the third period that eventually turned into Spooner’s insurance marker. Kemppainen finished with a goal, two points, two shots on net, three hits and two takeaways in his 11-plus minutes of ice time, and showed some of the potential that’s been dormant in the first couple of weeks.

BLACK EYE: Travis Hamonic is a pretty solid defenseman, but he and Calvin de Haan had a tough night against the Bruins, with a combined minus-7 rating. They were hemmed into their own zone with the Bruins fore-check, and forced to endure some very long shifts that turned into scoring chances, and then goals for the Bruins. Hamonic finished a minus-4 with zero shots on net in 21:17 of ice time, and was on ice for four of the five goals scored by the Bruins in the game. The Islanders have a very strong top pairing duo in Johnny Boychuk and Nick Leddy, but they’ve got some work to do after that unit if tonight is any indication.

TURNING POINT: Claude Julien switched around the lines after watching Ryan Spooner blow a defensive assignment in the first period, and that really sparked the team after a miserable opening 20 minutes. Joonas Kemppainen and Ryan Spooner combined for a pair of goals after being put together on the same line, and the Bruins got offense from three of their four lines in another strong goal-producing performance. But it really can be pointed back to the Bruins head coach deciding that he needed to tinker with things after not seeing anything he liked in a mostly dreadful first period. The Bruins only allowed eight shots on net in the final 40 minutes of the game after Julien played mix-and-match with the forwards.

HONORABLE MENTION: Jones Gustavsson stopped 23-of-26 shots, and was at his best in the first period when he made 16 saves to keep the Bruins in a game that the Islanders had dominated to that point. Once the Bruins survived that initial onslaught with the aid of Gustavsson, he only saw a couple of good chances against while the Bruins defense truly stiffened around him. Gustavsson now has two of Boston’s three wins on the season, and he once again just did enough against the Islanders to earn a win. It was nothing spectacular or breathtaking. It was simple, good goaltending and stopping the shots that should be stopped.

BY THE NUMBERS: 1,200 – the number of regular season games for Zdeno Chara in his Hall of Fame career after suiting up Friday night against the Islanders, the team that originally drafted and developed him.

QUOTE TO NOTE: "It was a model of how we'd like to play. We need to play hard, we need to be aggressive and we need to play the full 60 minutes. It’s a good example to build on and now we need to bring that game at home.” –Claude Julien, on a Bruins team that improved to 3-0-0 on the road with a solid win over a good Islanders club.

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