The Boston Bruins season has come to an end unceremoniously after a record-breaking regular season.
Boston finished the 2022-23 regular season with a 65-12-5 record, which amounted to 135 points, a new NHL record. The Bruins were the hottest team in the league and looked unstoppable.
David Pastrnak had a career year tallying 61 goals and 52 assists. It was the first time he tallied more than 100 points in his career. Linus Ullmark will likely win the Vezina Trophy after winning 40 games. The goaltender also had a 1.89 goals against average and a .938 save percentage.
But everything came crashing down for Boston in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. After going up 3-1 in the series against the Florida Panthers, the Bruins looked like a completely different team, and now their season is over.
While things seem quite bleak in Boston, the sky is not falling. There is still reason to be happy about how the 2022-23 season went.
At the end of the day, the Bruins had the best regular season in NHL history. That isn’t an honor that you just throw in the trash. While it is disappointing that Boston couldn’t do what the 1972 Montreal Canadians did, they should still be proud.
The importance of Patrice Bergeron was also on display in this series. With the center missing the majority of the series, Boston was without a crucial fixture of their roster, and it showed.
While hindsight is 20/20, having Bergeron on the ice could have limited the mistakes that the Bruins made defensively. If the center was on the ice for all seven games, the series would have looked completely different.
Most Bruins fans already were rooting for this, but there needs to be a Bergeron statue in Boston, and the Selke Award should be renamed to the Bergeron Award. His importance to this organization can’t be overstated. He is a legend in every form of the word.
Bergeron is also still at the top of his game. While he had an emotional exit from the TD Garden ice after the Game 7 loss, the center can still play if he wants. At 35 years old, he racked up 27 goals and 31 assists. If he returns for the 2023-24 season, he will still perform at a high level.
So while it is okay to be disappointed with Boston’s early exit, Bruins fans should still be excited by Boston’s performance this past season. While records are meant to be broken, they don’t get broken all the time (especially this points record). Not winning a Stanley Cup will sting with the talent that was on the roster, but the accomplishments the team was able to reach are still something worth writing home about.
Winning a Stanley Cup is the ultimate goal for every team, but not winning the trophy doesn’t mean that an entire season’s worth of great performances should be thrown away. Fans should still be pleased by the Bruins performance this season and excited about what the future looks like in Boston.
Season 4. Episode 39. The Off Season – Bruins Benders Podcast
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