Home is Where the Heart is

Whether it be a parent returning from a long day at work, a college student returning from their semester away from the family, or our brave men and women overseas coming back from a tour of duty, there is something special about coming home. Home is a place in which it is easy to feel safe, comfortable, and surrounded by the people who love you. And in the world of sports, home is where teams play their best. Rarely does a team preform better on the road than at home. In hockey, there were only six teams out of 30 to have a better record away from their friendly confines. But that was just in the regular season. There is nothing quite like a playoff atmosphere in a team's home building because it fuels teams that appear to be down for the count. And last night, the Boston Bruins fans gave them fuel, gave them fire, and propelled them to that which they all desired: a statement win in Bean Town.

The Boston Bruins rolled the Vancouver Canucks in game three of the Stanley Cup Finals 8-1 to make the series 2-1 in favor of Vancouver. The Boston crowd was in in from the beginning, and the B's were doing something early that they had not been in the great white north: outhitting the Canucks. Boston had played to Vancouver's offensive pace in the great white north, and that put them in an 0-2 hole. The blue collar, low scoring style of play is when the Bruins are at their best; and in a game in which the hits never seemed to stop, the Bruins had 40 hits compared to Vancouver's 31. And it was one of these hits by Vancouver's Aaron Rome that gave Bruins wing Nathan Horton a serious concussion. After Horton was taken off the ice in a stretcher, the fans were rilled up, and the Bruins released the Kraken on Vancouver.

After a great scoreless first period played by both teams, it was all Bruins in the second 20 minutes. Eleven seconds into the second period, deffensmen Andrew Ference scored his third goal of these playoffs from the passes of Rich Peverly and David Krejci. Later in the period, the pathetic Bruins power play managed itself a goal off of the stick of Mark Recchi to take a two nothing lead. But the Bruins were far from done. After 11 minutes and 30 seconds of play, a Vancouver turnover in their own zone resulted in a Brad Marchand unassisted shorthand goal. And a few minutes later, David Krejci added the exclamation point in Boston's four goal period with his eleventh goal of the playoffs. Although the Canucks avoided a shutout by Jannik Hansen's goal, that was not enough to stop the Bruins rampage. Four more goals from Daniel Paille, Mark Recchi, Chris Kelly, and *gasp* another power play goal from Michael Ryder completed the beat down.

But the overwhelming penalties and dirty play by both teams in this game is something to take note of. Between the two teams a total of 145 penalty minutes were accumulated during the course of the game, including 110 minutes from game misconducts. The cause of the penalties in the third period were about an even split between Vancouver being frustrated because they were down by four goals, and the Bruins being frustrated by what happened to Horton. But there is a line between physical play and dirty play that both teams crossed last night. Boone's hit that took out Horton was well after Horton had passed the puck and Millan Lucic slashed and then punched Burrows in the side of the head while he was down. And although the Bruins players taunting Burrows by holding their fingers in front of his mouth for the whole night was funny, expect the referees to call pretty much everything for the rest of the series.

I got your nose, I got your nose

Boston's performance at home in game three has given the team, and the city of Boston new hope that they could still hoist Lord Stanley's Cup. Because every team, no matter what the sport, loves a little home cooking.