Bruins are at even strength

Workhorse Thornton helps forge tie

[ Game summary ]

By Nancy Marrapese-Burrell, Globe Staff, 1/21/2003

hroughout the 1990s, and for most of the '80s, when the Bruins were down and needed a player to strap the team to his back and carry them, it was Ray Bourque who did it time and time again.

Yesterday, another Bruins captain, Joe Thornton, did the same thing. Was it a victory? No. It was a 3-3 tie with the Washington Capitals at the FleetCenter. But with the way the club's fortunes have gone lately, and after being down twice by two goals, it felt like a win.

Thornton was a workhorse the way Bourque was for 20-plus years. The 23-year-old center, aided in no small part by right wing Glen Murray, had a goal and two assists. He logged 29 minutes 41 seconds (a season high for him, a game high yesterday), which was significantly up from his average of 21:46. He skated through 26 shifts, tied for a game-high six shots on net, and won 19 of the 29 faceoffs.

''Our line has to step up offensively,'' said Thornton. ''We expect to go out there and score a couple of goals every night. If we score a couple of goals and everybody pitches in, this is a good team.''

They haven't played like a good team often since their run in October and November. With the tie, the Bruins are unbeaten in consecutive games for the first time since since Dec. 21 and 23.

Things didn't look great when the Bruins gave up a pair of goals in the opening period to fall behind, 2-0. Robert Lang, who played three games with Boston back in 1997-98, scored on the power play at 4:24, and Peter Bondra tallied his 19th of the year at 10:55.

Boston closed the gap at 14:44 of the second when Thornton scored on the man-advantage. Brian Rolston kept in the puck at the left point, and Jozef Stumpel teed up a slapper that was blocked by Mike Grier. But Stumpel got the puck back and dished a pass from the right circle to Thornton, who pinballed it past goalie Olaf Kolzig.

Any elation the team had was offset when the Bruins were penalized for too many men on the ice, the fourth such infraction in three games. Defenseman Sergei Gonchar scored with two seconds left in the period, helped when Washington captain Steve Konowalchuk sticked goalie Steve Shields in the chin and forced his head back, and it was 3-1 heading into the third.

Rolston scored on the power play at 3:08 to make it 3-2, but there was still a steep hill to climb. Defenseman Bryan Berard was whistled off for a double minor for high sticking at 10:10, a disadvantage made worse by the fact that one of Boston's best penalty killers, P.J. Axelsson, went out with a back injury earlier in the period. But the Bruins killed off the four minutes.

''Huge. It was huge,'' said coach Robbie Ftorek. ''It's a situation where we could've easily given up a goal and that could've been possibly the end of it but the guys on the bench said, `Let's get it done.' And they went out and did it.''

Murray brought the Bruins all the way back at 15:34 with his 25th goal of the year. But it was Thornton's presence that made the difference in this one.

''Obviously, Joe came back and he's been pretty much dominant the last two games,'' said Rolston. ''He brings a big lift to our team.''

Because of the injuries and circumstance of being behind, Ftorek had to ride his big guns. Murray logged 27:38, much more than his average of 22:03.

''We were behind and we needed to get some goals, and that line has a tendency to get some for us,'' said the coach, ''so we went with them a little bit more and we had a couple of injuries so we had to shorten the bench, which meant them seeing some more time.

''We had a few less penalty killers, which enabled Muzz and Joey to get a little more ice time.''

Thornton wasn't even fazed by the presence of referee Mike Hasenfratz, who was one of the two officials he strongly criticized after being ejected from Friday's game in Atlanta.

''I saw him when I went out there, but he can't do nothing about it now,'' said Thornton.

That's something most teams could say about Thornton himself.

''I played a lot,'' said the captain. ''I was pretty tired out there. Our line has to pick it up every game. We're going to play a lot more with some guys hurt, but we're up to the task. We want to play a lot.''

This story ran on page D1 of the Boston Globe on 1/21/2003.
© Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company.