The Boston Bruins scored twice in each of the first two periods and cruised to a 4-1 win over the visiting Calgary Flames to begin a five-game homestand on Thursday night.
Sean Kuraly (one goal, one assist) and Elias Lindholm lit the lamp within a 2:18 span in the opening frame to build a lead that the Bruins would never relinquish.
Mason Lohrei and Casey Mittelstadt also scored and Tanner Jeannot dished out two assists for Boston, which has gained points in four of its last five games (3-1-1).
Bruins goaltender Joonas Korpisalo made 28 saves en route to his first victory since Dec. 11.
Connor Zary scored the lone goal and Dustin Wolf stopped 26 shots for the Flames, who have lost four in a row.
Boston had a 30-29 shots advantage. Both teams went 0-for-2 on the power play.
Kuraly put an end to the game’s sluggish start with the opening goal at the 9:48 mark, taking a drop feed from Jeannot — who came across the blue line on the right side — and freeing himself for a wrist shot from the slot.
Lindholm’s third goal in a four-game span extended the Boston lead to 2-0 at 12:06. A precision-passing sequence between Marat Khusnutdinov and David Pastrnak on a transition rush set up the goal, with the star winger feeding Lindholm with a cross-ice pass to the left circle.
Though Calgary’s chances were limited early, Korpisalo made several key saves around the midway mark of the middle frame. He sprawled towards an open near side to make a second stop on Matt Coronato and then robbed Morgan Frost point-blank minutes later.
Lohrei gave the Bruins a 3-0 advantage at 14:02 of the second. The defenseman made a pull-drag move to separate from his defender and beat Wolf with a top-shelf wrister from the left side.
The Boston lead reached four with 2:01 left in the second, as Mittelstadt had a shot from the left dot saved before crashing the net to score his own rebound.
Zary got the visitors on the board just 45 seconds later, making it a 4-1 game before the end of the period. After a Kevin Bahl point shot and a Frost tip, Zary drove the puck around the net and made a move to the bottom of the right circle to score.
–Field Level Media
