Boston Bruins forward served with two-game suspension?

Max Talbot, a Boston Bruins forward, has been handed a two-game suspension without pay because of a delay-hit with an accident last Sunday’s game against the New Jersey Devils.

The accident occurred at around 14:30 of the second period.

Jiri Tlusty also stayed in the game after the delay-hit, which happened well after he had let go of the disc, and was obviously worthy of a penalty for interference.

Tlusty, after losing a back tooth, said that Talbot would have been able to avoid the blow.

The accident occurred in the second period at around 14:30 of Boston’s 2-1 victory over the New Jersey Devils last Sunday. After Jiri Tlusty cycled the puck in the Bruins’ corner, Talbot managed to deliver a late hit that made contact with the Devils’ head forward.

The league has added that even if all of the players must be aware of their environment, it was perfectly reasonable for Jiri to not expect to contact a lot of time after possession, and that Talbot does not initiate contact until after that. The player should also be prepared for an opponent to finish his check-up.

Talbot will lose $19,354.84 in his salary. He will be missing Boston’s home game Tuesday against St. Louis Blues and Saturday against Buffalo Sabres, and then will be eligible to return Sunday in Ottawa.

“It dropped on the ice. The shovel guys probably picked it up,” he said.

Was Talbot really deserving of the suspension? Or was the accident really just that – an accident? Well, may this serve as a lesson for Talbot.

Good news, Bruins fans: Boston Bruins continues winning streak

Right-winger David Pastrnak scored the go-ahead goal towards the end of the second period which led the Boston Bruins to a 5-3 victory against the New York Islanders at the Barclays Center.

The young defenders of the Boston Bruins made less mistakes, and if it were not for some of the first lucky bounces, they could have put the game away in the second period. They learned from their mistakes against the Philadelphia Flyers. This time, after having secured a two-goal advantage they maintained the pressure with a constant presence in the offensive zone. This kept the New York Islanders bottled up in the last period and that, in turn, handed the victory to the Boston Bruins.

“It’s a weird game — some buildings, you just can’t win,” said Boston Bruins’ first goal scorer, right wing Brett Connolly. “I know last year, Montreal, just for whatever reason, we couldn’t get anything going against them.”

Josh Bailey’s equaliser for the New York Islanders was followed just 1:19 by Cizikas’s tally which gave his team a 2-1 lead and the momentum after the Boston Bruins had held a 1-0 lead half way through the period.

“Then you come into New York and we play well,” Connolly said. “So it’s a funny game. Some buildings, you just play well.”

The Boston Bruins return home to take on the Arizona Coyotes on Tuesday. Once again, they have the ability to get above the .500 mark for the season. We hope that this will be the time that the Black and Gold can do it.

Boston Bruins working to get back into the playoff picture

We are now only a few weeks away from the start of the 2015-16 NHL season. This means that questions are being asked, and some answers are starting to emerge.

The fractured hand that Brett Connolly suffered during his second Boston Bruins practice healed just in time for him to take part in the Bruins’ last five games, but the 23-year-old right wing knows that he has a lot to prove in the three weeks before the 2015-16 campaign begins.

Connolly, who has signed a one-year contract to stay with the Boston Bruins, will compete for one of the places on the wing that have been created by the departure of Milan Lucic and Reilly Smith. Forwards Matt Beleskey and Jimmy Hayes have also joined the team. They will bring a unique mix of skill, speed, and physical strength to the Boston Bruins.

Although the Boston Bruins had a narrow miss in last year’s season, the team made the post-season in the seven consecutive years before that. During the 2015 season the Boston Bruins have made a lot of moves with the hope of getting back into the playoff picture.

Connolly is positive about the Boston Bruins’ chances. “It’s going to be a fun year,” he says. “Obviously, it’s a great city, great fans. We’ve got a great leadership core here, guys that have won. It’s a good position for me and a lot of the new guys here to come in and be a factor and be a difference-maker. So, we’re all excited.”

Ice hockey icon and former Bruins player announces his retirement

Legendary ice hockey player Simon Gagne, who played for 14 seasons and three different teams in the National Hockey League, has officially announced that he is retiring from the sport immediately.

An ice hockey icon, Gagne’s ice hockey career began in 1998 when he joined the Philadelphia Flyers. He left the Philadelphia Flyers to join the Broad Street Bullies, for which he played with for 11 seasons. He finished his ice hockey career with a brief stint playing with the Boston Bruins, a team that had been struggling to score goals and win matches.

Gagne played in 23 games with the Boston Bruins, playing in a variety of positions and scoring three goals and an assist for four points. However, after two months of playing with the Boston Bruins team, Gagne had to take time off to care for his father who had fallen ill. Sadly, his father died shortly afterwards and at that point, Gagne was suspended to make room on the roster for his replacement.

Half way through the current season, Gagne decided that he needed to spend more time with his family, and as a result he took the rest of the year off. It was at that point the Boston Bruins team agreed to terminate Gagne’s contract and release him.

Gagne enjoyed a long playing career and was one of the best ice hockey players of his era. He was one of ice hockey’s true gentleman. He will surely be remembered with affection by his former team-mates and companions.

Big changes hope to bring big scores for the Bruins

The Boston Bruins are home again at Ristuccia Arena where they have started their practice sessions recently. On Monday, Zdeno Chara, the captain of the squad said that nine of the Bruins (and one borrowed ECHL goalie) were preparing for their first day of practice since last year and the B’s captain did not disappoint.

“I’m feeling better and that’s the most important thing,” Chara said. “I didn’t do any extreme traveling stuff [during the summer]. I stayed with family and focused on recovering from the injuries I had toward the end of the season.”

Zdeno has been with the league for 17 years. The last year has been a difficult year for the big Slovak, who has put on only eight goals for a total of twenty points. His goal is to go forward with the 2015-16 season. He has already strategized everything to fix last season’s problems, and hit the ice with the new determination for the month of October.

The Bruins finished behind the Pittsburgh Penguins by two points and, that has led to big changes in their staff, both management and roster. Gone is their GM, Peter Chiarelli. Taking over is assistant GM Don Sweeney, while Dougie Hamilton (defense) and Milan Lucic (forward) swapped positions.

“It’s tough to see guys being gone, but we all saw management announce that they were making changes to try and improve the team,” Chara said. “The most frequent word that came out of last season was ‘inconsistency.’ It’s what we have to work on; we can’t have ups and downs.”

Bruins affiliate agreement: Stingrays out, Gladiators in

Gwinnett Gladiators is Boston Bruins’ new ECHL affiliate.

The announcement was made last August 6, with Bruins GM Don Sweeney saying that Bruins players from their development system could now be designated for assignment with the Gladiators for the 2015-2016 season. And the players who make it in this year’s development camp can soon join Gwinnett.

According to the Gwinnett Daily Post, Andy Brandt, the head coach of the Gladiators is quite happy and excited about the agreement.

The East Coast Hockey League‘s Gladiators are the third team coming from the ECHL to be affiliated with the Bruins. with the previous teams being Reading Royals and South Carolina Stingrays.

For the last four years, the Gladiators had been affiliated with the Arizona Coyotes. For eight season prior to that, the Gwinnett were Atlanta Thrashers ECHL affiliate. Over the last season, the Gladiators also had short-term affiliations with the Buffalo Sabres, Columbus Blue Jackets and Chicago Blackhawks.

The Bruins, and their primary development team Providence Bruins, had been affiliated with the Stingrays, who happens to be the Gladiators’ division rival, from 2012-2015. Adam Morrison, Frankie Simonelli and Andrew Ammon were the Bruins players that skated for the South Carolina last season.

Sweeney himself was happy with Thursday’s agreement with the ECHL team.

Guess the new ECHL affiliate of Boston Bruins?

The Boston Bruins are now changing their ECHL partner, after working with the South Carolina Stingrays for three years.

On Thursday, the Bruins announced a new partnership with the Gwinnett Gladiators, which marked the squad’s third affiliation with an ECHL team in association history. The deal for this forthcoming season will allow the B’s to designate their players to the Gladiators for improvement.

The Gladiators ended last in the ECHL’s Easter Division in the

previous year, with a 20-45-3-4 (W-L-OTL-SOL) record and a minus-89 goal differential. However, Boston saw a lot of similarities between them and their new affiliates in the way they hone players, prompting the partnership to be born.

Bruins GM Don Sweeney told the press that the new affiliation would provide a great opportunity for the Black and Gold amateurs to continue growing and helping them to reach their full potential as professional hockey players. Now that they’re affiliated with the Bruins, the Gladiators will also benefit by getting some strong and solid players from the B’s. which will aid in pulling them out from the lowest spot in their division.

Boston is the sixth team to associate with the Gladiators in their history. The latter’s previous NHL affiliations include the Atlanta Thrashers, Chicago Blackhawks, Columbus Blue Jackets, Buffalo Sabres and the Arizona Coyotes.

On the other hand, the Stingrays wouldn’t be left without an affiliate as they’ve been connected to two NHL squads over the past few years – the Boston Bruins and the Washington Capitals.

Bruins owner, Jacobs: “Firing Chiarelli was the right move!”

Boston Bruins boss Jeremy Jacobs stated that his former general manager Peter Chiarelli had “a great hockey mind.”

But unfortunately,the Black and Gold found itself in a challenging situation because of the sacked manager.

Jacobs was asked by Steve Conroy of the Boston Herald regarding the head’s decision on firing the current Edmonton Oilers general manager Chiarelli in April. Convoy asked the B’s owner about the time he realized that the right move was to terminate Chiarelli.

“When I recognized he wasn’t prepared to make the changes that needed to be made,” Jacobs gamely answered.

According to Jacobs, Peter had that inability to deal effectively with the salary cap which became a threat to the team. In fact, the Bruins owner somewhat sounded like he had regrets in keeping Chiarelli around longer than necessary and not handing over the decision to his son Charlie and Boston team president Cam Neely.

Under the sacked manager’s leadership, salary cap was the Bruins’ biggest problem. That salary cap problem was brought by keeping various replaceable players that were given long-standing, no-trade contracts.

However, in the Don Sweeney era, the Bruins are finally given some breathing space due to the trading of Dougie Hamilton and Milan Lucic who had big salary cap size then.

With the Bruins latest moves, we will see if they’ll have better performance on the ice in the 2015-16 season.

It’s official: NCAA best goalie signs with the Bruins

Zane McIntyre, University of North Dakota goaltender, recently agreed to a two-year entry-level deal with the Boston Bruins, according to a team release.

It was during the 2010 NHL Entry Draft that the Bruins selected the 6-foot-2 tall goaltender in the sixth round (165th overall). He has spent the last five years participating in the B’s development camps.

McIntyre won the Mike Richter Award last season as the best goalie in college hockey and was a finalist for the Hobey Baker Award for the best player in the country.

The 22-year-old Minnesota-native has played the last three seasons at the University of North Dakota, putting up a record of 58-24-9 for the Fighting Sioux.

Notably, he led the NCAA in wins and helped UND reach the 2015 Frozen Four at TD Garden in Boston.

It was only last season that McIntyre impressively tallied 29 wins. He managed to acquire a strong 2.05 goals-against average and a solid .929 save percentage.

However, McIntyre previously confirmed that he had chosen to turn pro after three seasons at UND.

He attended the Bruins training camp last fall and the B’s GM Don Sweeney has raved about him during that time.

If he doesn’t make the team, he’s expected to play with the Providence Bruins in the American Hockey League.

Boston Bruins now loaded with defensive free agents – who are they?

The Boston Bruins announced the signing of three more players on Monday, including Massachusetts native Jimmy Hayes, whom they acquired in a trade last week with Florida.

Hayes, also known as ‘The Pride of Dorchester’, signed a three-year contract through the 2017-18 season with a cap hit of $2.3 million.

The 25-year-old Hayes has played 72 games for the Florida Panthers during the 2014-15 season and recorded 19 goals (third on the team) and 16 assists for 35 points.

Moreover, the former Panthers forward has competed in 168 NHL games from 2011 to 2015 for the Chicago Blackhawks and Panthers, tallying 66 points (36 goals, 30 assists).

Aside from Hayes, the B’s also inked deal with forward Brett Connolly to a one-year contract through the 2015-16 season with a cap hit of $1,025,000 at the NHL level.

The 23-year-old Connolly, who happens to be the last of the Peter Chiarelli deals, appeared in the last five games of the season for the Bruins and collected a pair of assists, alternating between the third and fourth lines.

The restricted free agent has skated in 139 career NHL games for Tampa and Boston and registered 18 goals and 16 assists with 82 penalty minutes. In his 50 games with Tampa Bay in 2014-15, Connolly had 12 goals and three assists while accruing 38 penalty minutes before being acquired by the Bruins. In five games with the B’s last season, he picked up two assists.

Connolly’s combination of size and skill makes him a nice fit for the Bruins style of play and a piece of the puzzle as they try to replace Milan Lucic, who was traded to the Los Angeles Kings before the 2015 National Hockey League Draft.

Lastly, the Black and Gold also signed forward Brandon DeFazio to a one-year, two-way contract through the 2015-16 season, which was worth a cap figure of $575,000 at the NHL level.