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From NEHJ: Bruins reclaim Hub of Hockey
Editor’s note: This story originally appeared in the June 2011 issue of New England Hockey Journal.
For loyal fans of the Boston Bruins, convincing those around them to give hockey the time of day has
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The Bruins celebrate their Eastern Conference championship -- and a Stanley Cup Finals matchup against Vancouver-- after their thrilling, 1-0 victory over the Lightning in Game 7 last month. (Jim Rogash/Getty Images) |
been a lifelong battle. Oftentimes, unfortunately, it has been a losing one.
While the Black and Gold haven’t been completely mired in misery since the glory days of the Big, Bad Bruins, the amount of hockey-induced heartache doled out every spring since the team last captured the Stanley Cup in 1972 has kept an Original Six franchise in the shadows of its Boston sports brethren for the better part of four decades.
Those of us not lucky enough to have inhabited the old Garden to witness such greats as Bobby Orr, Phil Esposito and Johnny Bucyk sport the Spoked-B are often reminded that Boston was once a hockey town, one in which every member of the Bruins — whether a star or a spare part — was treated like a god.
But somewhere along the way — especially in the past decade — that all changed. The Red Sox surged back to the forefront and famously ended their infamous 86-year curse. The Patriots rode the dynamic duo of Tom Brady and Bill Belichick to three Super Bowl titles plus a season of near perfection. The Celtics put an end to their own misfortune by re-creating the “Big Three” with Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen to raise their historic 17th championship banner in 2008 — their first in more than 20 years.
The Bruins? They were busy trying to figure out how to shift out
of neutral, a gear they’d been stuck in since Cam Neely hung
up his skates in the mid-’90s and, more recently, Ray Bourque
was sent packing for the Rocky Mountains.
If winning cures everything, it’s no wonder hockey has been
such a tough sell, as the Bruins have left their fans’ hopes
of glory mortally wounded season after season.
From 2000 to 2008, the Bruins failed to win a single playoff
series. They traded away three of their captains in Bourque, Jason
Allison and Joe Thornton, all while waving goodbye to one talented
player after another — only to replace them with pluggers or
aged veterans who were eons past their primes throughout most of
the decade.
With continuity non-existent and a Stanley Cup looking completely
out of reach, a franchise that once qualified for the playoffs for
a record 29 consecutive seasons was in utter disarray. General
manager Peter Chiarelli, and subsequently Claude Julien —
hired as head coach after the disastrous, Dave Lewis-led, 2006-07
campaign — were largely responsible for a dramatic
turnaround.
Like a wide-eyed kid staring at an elaborate, 500-piece puzzle,
Chiarelli has spent the past few years figuring out where all of
the pieces fit in order for the Bruins to be successful in the
playoffs. The GM thought he had it solved in 2009 when the Black
and Gold finished as the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference, only
to be let down when they bowed out in the second round. After a
trying regular season the following year, the Bruins seemed poised
to get over the hump and into the conference finals, only to blow a
3-0 series lead against the Flyers.
And it was the reaction from the fans that was so fitting, such a
testament to how low the expectations had sunk for the Black and
Gold. This was your typical Bruins, lifting your hopes for an
instant only to rip your heart out.
After falling behind 0-2 in their opening-round series against the
Canadiens this spring, it was here-we-go-again time in Boston. The
Bruins, runaway winners of the Northeast Division, were going to
blow it yet again.
But, as New England and the rest of the world soon found out, this
wasn’t your Bruins of recent years. This was a club with more
talent and more resilience than any team in the Hub of Hockey had
possessed in nearly two decades. This was a team that believed in
one another and simply refused to lose.
After being seemingly bound for another early exit from the
playoffs, the Bruins found themselves as one of the two teams left
standing just six weeks later, exorcizing many a playoff demon
along the way. After vanquishing the Habs and climbing out of an
0-2 hole for the first in franchise history, the Bruins avenged
last year’s meltdown by sweeping the Flyers in Round 2.
Leading up to their decisive seventh game against the Tampa Bay
Lightning in the Eastern Conference finals, their first trip to
that stage since 1992, the Bruins themselves took notice of their
burgeoning popularity around town.
“I walked over today and saw everybody with their Bruins
stuff on and got about 20 high-fives,” Andrew Ference said of
his trip to the morning skate before Game 7. “So people are
pumped up. Of course, they should be. Everybody has seen so much
success in this city with different sports and they want the Bruins
to have success as well.”
Still, negative thoughts prevailed for many, as those who’d
grown accustomed to being let down by the Black and Gold hoped for
the best but expected the worst that night. What they got was the
biggest victory their hometown team has earned in more than 20
years and the highest decibel level TD Garden has reached in its
15-plus years of existence, as the Bruins beat the Bolts 1-0 to
advance to the Stanley Cup Finals.
Heading into their series against the champions of the Western
Conference, the Vancouver Canucks, the Bruins were elated to have
finally reached such great heights and provided their fans with a
playoff ride they’ll likely never forget. However, their
mission wasn’t quite done yet.
“It’s kind of our turn to return the favor to all the
fans and show how good of a team we can be,” winger Brad
Marchand said. “We want to go all the way for them.
They’ve been waiting a long time for a Cup, so hopefully we
can win it.”
For Julien, restoring the region’s once-wavering faith in
its hockey club always has been a major part of his mission as the
Bruins bench boss, especially with all of the other major sports
teams in Boston having such great success.
“Well, I think that’s been the goal from Day
One,” Julien said. “We’ve always wanted to bring
that excitement back to this city. And to be at the stage we are
right now, it’s great.”
Win or lose against the Canucks, the Bruins have proven a ton to
those that have stuck with them through thick and thin, as well as
the locals who might have turned their backs on the Black and Gold
over the past 39 years — the same individuals who likely
played a key role in the team completely selling out season tickets
for next season.
This is a squad that has been constructed to win both now and in
the future, with a tremendous foundation of youth, skill, big-game
performers and natural-born leaders to build upon. This is a group
of men, both young and old, that has proven that no amount of
adversity can deter them from trying to reach their ultimate
goal.
But most important of all, this is now an organization
that’s united from top to bottom, striving together to reward
its passionate fans with a championship and proving they have
everything and everyone in place to do so.
With that, they have deservingly received all of New
England’s attention throughout their magical playoff run.
They have accomplished what many thought no Bruins team might ever
do. At long last, they have made Boston a hockey town once
again.
Jesse Connolly can be reached at jconnolly@hockeyjournal.com
