With four teams still remaining with the chance to hold the Stanley Cup in less than four weeks, the conference finals started Saturday night with the East leading things off. With 10 days off since sweeping the Washington Capitals, the Tampa Bay Lightning was the one that didn’t seem bothered by the long rest period as they were able to score three goals in a span of 1:25 en route to defeating the Boston Bruins on the road 5-2.
The win was the eighth straight for the Bolts, which was able to suck the life out of the crown at TD Garden with the game going from 0-0 to 3-0 quicker than it took someone to get a bag of popcorn from the concession stand. The first goal was scored by Sean Bergenheim at 11:15 when he was able to slam home a rebound from Tim Thomas. His eighth goal of the season was assisted by Dominic Moore and Victor Hedman.
The second Lightning goal was scored by Brett Clark when he lifted a simple backhanded shot over the shoulder of Thomas. The goal came 19 seconds after the Bergemehim goal. Just over a minute later, Teddy Percell worked the 1-3-1 forecheck style to perfection when he forced a turnover to the left of Thomas behind the net and was able to stuff it in to send the Boston crowd into loud booing and jeers for the home side.
Boston bench boss Claude Julien called timeout to regroup his team and it worked. Playing in his first game of the playoffs, rookie sensation Tyler Seguin got the crowd on its feet when he went 1-on-1 with Mike Lundin, crossed him over and was able to fire a snap shot below the glove of Dwayne Roloson to cut their deficit to 3-1.
It would be over two hours real-time before the next goal was scored when Marc-Andre Bergeron scored a power play goal with just over six minutes remaining. Late-game goals were scored by Simon Gagne and Johnny Boychuk. Seguin got the assist on the Boychuk goal, putting him with two playoff points in his first career playoff game.
In goal, both goalies faced 33 shots. The difference is that Thomas made 29 saves while Roloson stopped 31 shots from the Bruins. Game two is Tuesday night, and the teams will play every-other day until someone will be presented with the Prince of Wales Trophy.
