![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1776840608_575_shilton_kristen.png&h=80&w=80&scale=crop.png\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Kristen ShiltonApr 22, 2026, 12:34 AM ET<\/p>\n
Close<\/a>Kristen Shilton is a national NHL reporter for ESPN.<\/p>\n Multiple Authors<\/p>\n BUFFALO, N.Y. — It wasn’t quite a Picasso by Boston, in the end.<\/p>\n But the Bruins<\/a> got the job done Tuesday in a 4-2 victory<\/a> over the Buffalo Sabres<\/a>, tying their Eastern Conference first-round playoff series at 1-1.<\/p>\n Game 3 is in Boston on Thursday.<\/p>\n The Bruins, who let a two-goal lead slip late in Game 1 Sunday, stormed ahead in Game 2 with four goals in the first 41 minutes. Viktor Arvidsson<\/a> scored two, Pavel Zacha<\/a> another, and Morgan Geekie<\/a> added his second of the postseason to keep the crowd quiet.<\/p>\n “That goal, when you start on the road, is to get one of two,” Geekie said. “We gave ourselves a chance to win both, and unfortunately let the first one slip away, and we learned from that. It’s huge … and super important to get one and go back home to play in front of our fans.”<\/p>\n Goaltender Jeremy Swayman<\/a> bounced back for Boston with 34 saves. He posted two scoreless periods in Game 2, adding to his total of four for the series.<\/p>\n “The series doesn’t start until you win one on the road. And that’s important for us,” Swayman said. “We thought we had a really good chance to finish it out last game, too. So, I think that we fixed a lot of great things and took positives and really stayed in the moment. That’s the biggest thing for our group.”<\/p>\n Bruins coach Marco Sturm didn’t make any lineup changes for Game 2, convinced that his squad was prepared to bounce back.<\/p>\n “They played their way. They played to our identity,” Sturm said. “Let’s put it that way. That was Bruins hockey from start to finish and why we put them away. We played more physical. That’s something they wanted to do and get better on our forecheck, but also protecting a little bit more … and be a bit more aggressive.”<\/p>\n It looked as if that aggressiveness would lead to an easy win, but Buffalo made things interesting again in the final frame, scoring two goals in the final seven minutes. But this time, Boston smothered the Sabres attempt to come all the way back.<\/p>\n Defenseman Bowen Byram<\/a> got the Sabres on the board with a wrist shot that spoiled Swayman’s shutout bid. Then, with the Sabres’ net empty, Peyton Krebs<\/a> buried a rebounding puck that teammate Rasmus Dahlin<\/a> fired off the post behind Swayman.<\/p>\n Sturm called a timeout to help settle down his players.<\/p>\n “I think it was a momentum shift,” Swayman said. “I knew we wouldn’t have a TV timeout after the goal call, so it was just important to get everyone to take a breath. I thought the momentum shifted a little, and kudos to my group for responding extremely well.”<\/p>\n The first period was back and forth but riddled with penalties — and non-calls — that brought out animated reactions from players parading to the box and coaches behind the bench. But after 20 physical minutes it was still scoreless.<\/p>\n And then Boston opened the floodgates.<\/p>\n A backhander from Arvidsson beat Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen<\/a> to open the scoring, and then the Bruins received a fortunate bounce. Geekie sent a floater on net from center ice that Luukkonen misread as it skipped by him into the net.<\/p>\n Editor’s Picks<\/p>\n 2 Related<\/p>\n “I don’t think I ever will [score] like that again,” Geekie said. “Honestly, I just tried to dump it in, and it was a lucky bounce. You hate to see those go in, regardless of who it is. You just try to have the mentality of putting pucks on net.”<\/p>\n When Buffalo’s Tage Thompson<\/a> was called for interference late in the period, Zacha gave the Bruins a 3-0 lead. Arvidsson’s second tally came in the first minute of the third.<\/p>\n Buffalo coach Lindy Ruff stuck with Luukkonen to start the third. But faced with a 4-0 deficit, he eventually pulled Luukkonen in favor of Alex Lyon<\/a>.<\/p>\n Sturm mentioned after Game 1 that his second line of Zacha, Arvidsson and Casey Mittelstadt<\/a> needed to improve. They answered the bell with a combined three goals and five points in Game 2.<\/p>\n “I called those guys out for a reason,” Sturm said. “They just needed a [push].”<\/p>\n The intensity ramped up once Boston was so far ahead. When Charlie McAvoy<\/a> put a low hit on Beck Malenstyn<\/a>, that encouraged Logan Stanley<\/a> and Mark Kastelic<\/a> to drop the gloves. The game took another turn when Nikita Zadorov<\/a> hit Zach Benson<\/a>, and Alex Tuch<\/a> came barreling in with a response. That led to a number of scrums that took several minutes to break up.<\/p>\n Buffalo now can prepare for what’s to come in Boston, all the while knowing the bad blood could amplify.<\/p>\n “Every game you play,” Benson said, “you hate each other more.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kristen ShiltonApr 22, 2026, 12:34 AM ET CloseKristen Shilton is a national NHL reporter for ESPN. Multiple Authors…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":599114,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-599113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=599113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599113\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/599114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=599113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=599113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=599113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}