BOSTON — Jeremy Swayman remains perfect against the Toronto Maple Leafs this season. The Boston Bruins goalie, 3-0-0 in the regular season with a .959 save percentage against the Leafs, made 35 saves in his team’s 5-1 Game 1 win Saturday.
The big question is whether Swayman will start Game 2 on Monday. The Bruins have declined to answer whether they will use a pure goalie rotation between Swayman and Linus Ullmark.
Swayman’s scariest moment was a close call in the second period. He came out to play a puck after Charlie McAvoy lost a race against Auston Matthews. Swayman misplayed the puck, which allowed Matthews to whistle a shot off the post. Otherwise, Swayman was excellent, showing fast pads and good recoveries.
Jake DeBrusk scored two of the Bruins’ five goals, both in the second period.
McAvoy and Hampus Lindholm played together in both of the Bruins’ practices before Game 1. But coach Jim Montgomery did not use his power pair. Instead, Montgomery matched Lindholm and Brandon Carlo against Toronto’s No. 1 line of Matthews between Tyler Bertuzzi and Max Domi.
McAvoy and Matt Grzelcyk took most of their shifts against Matthew Knies, John Tavares and Mitch Marner.
Pat Maroon makes first-shift impact
On Pat Maroon’s first shift, the three-time champion drew Ryan Reaves and Joel Edmundson on the wall. By taking two Leafs with him, Maroon sprung Jesper Boqvist and Johnny Beecher for a two-on-one rush. Beecher, making his postseason debut, caught Boqvist’s pass and snapped the game’s first goal past Ilya Samsonov.
Later in the first, Maroon dumped Timothy Liljegren into the Bruins bench.
“When he’s on the ice, his ability to hang onto pucks, his ability to make plays, I think it’s incredibly underrated,” Montgomery said before the series. “A lot of people talk about Maroon and his fisticuffs, for lack of a better word. To me, he’s a hockey player. He’s won three Cups because he’s a hockey player.”
Jake DeBrusk strikes on power play
The Bruins made major power-play changes prior to Game 81. That included moving DeBrusk to the No. 2 unit as the net-front presence. On his first PP goal, DeBrusk whistled a shot through Samsonov from the top of the right circle with Morgan Geekie setting a screen. On his second, DeBrusk shoveled in a point-blank shot after receiving the puck from Brad Marchand.
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(Photo of Jeremy Swayman: Fred Kfoury III / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
