The Boston Bruins had the NHL’s best record (44-14-12) when the standard season was stopped in March in view of the COVID-19 pandemic. However when the 16-group Stanley Cup season finisher competition begins one week from now, the Bruins won’t be the favorite in the Eastern Conference.
As a component of the NHL’s restarted season, a cooperative competition was made to give the best four groups in every gathering important games before they face the champs from the eight-group capability round arrangement. Seeding for the accompanying rounds was to be controlled by how groups fared in the cooperative effort, with ordinary season focuses rates going about as the sudden death rounds.
Boston opened the East’s cooperative competition with misfortunes to the Philadelphia Flyers on Sunday and the Tampa Bay Lightning on Wednesday, making it numerically incomprehensible for the Bruins to procure the first or second seed in the East.
The Bruins possessed the standard season. However, two misfortunes in this postseason position delivered that achievement unimportant.
“That part sucks. I’m not going to lie to you,” coach Bruce Cassidy said. “But that’s the situation this year with the stoppage in play. We knew the rules coming into it, that we would lose a bit of the advantage we gained.”
The Bruins were more serious in their 3-2 misfortune to Tampa than they were in a 4-1 misfortune to the Flyers in their postseason opener. They get done with a game against the Washington Capitals on Aug. 9.
“We are where we are now,” Cassidy said. “We’re just trying to win a hockey game right now, get our game together so we can be our best, no matter who we meet.”
Which group the Bruins will meet in the season finisher quarterfinals is a riddle. Just because since 2012, the NHL is reseeding its season finisher adjusts. In spite of the fact that the seeding is significant in deciding adversaries, the games will be played inside void structures. Thus, “home ice advantage” isn’t as significant as it would be in normal postseasons, Cassidy said.
“This is one year where I think seeding is less relevant than others,” he said. But after finishing with a .714 points percentage — the best for the franchise since 1973-74 — watching the top seed in the East slip away in just two games was an annoyance.
“Would I rather be No. 1? Keep it? Absolutely. But that’s not going to happen,” Cassidy said. “You gotta win 16 games. We knew that going in. That’ll still be our goal.”
