Bruins regroup after loss in Tampa, aim to balance rest before playoffs
They could have grabbed a stranglehold on the Eastern Conference with a win in Tampa, but now it appears they may have to capture at least five of six points to assure them of home ice advantage through the Conference Finals.
Though there are just three more games left on the schedule, coach Bruce Cassidy maintained the “next game” mentality that's worked so well for his team when asked about weighing whether to rest some heavily worked players versus going all out to capture the top spot in the East.
“We're going to try to beat Florida tomorrow, to be honest with you,” said Cassidy. “We're going to decide on the rest accordingly. We're going to talk to players individually. Some of the guys who've played a lot of hockey are out, one permanently (Brandon Carlo), (Sean) Kuraly, Riley Nash, they've played a lot. They're out, so they're getting their rest now for lack of a better term. (Zdeno Chara) and Charlie (McAvoy) got some time off, (Patrice Bergeron and David Backes). Yeah, you've got some guys like (Tim) Schaller, (David Pastrnak) and (Brad) Marchand who've played a lot of hockey, though Marchy had a bit of break. (Torey) Krug, (Matt Grzelcyk), (Kevan) Miller, we'll monitor that going forward. We've tried to limit practice time. Today we went on, tomorrow we'll have an optional (morning skate). We just felt there were some things we needed to work on. I'll probably be able to answer it better on Saturday, so there is no plan. We'll go with the healthy guys tomorrow.”
