Tyler Bertuzzi plays mind games with latest shot at Bruins

The Toronto Maple Leafs might had fallen behind the Boston Bruins 3-1 earlier in their series, they have now forced a winner-take-all finale Saturday against their division rival. The Leafs won 2-1 on Thursday and could eliminate the Bruins this weekend. This would be a brutal reminder of last year’s playoffs for the Bruins when they were leading 3-1 in their first round series against the Florida Panthers only to be eliminated in seven games as the reigning Presidents’ Trophy winners.

When Leafs’ players met with media members, visibly focused on the task at hand and the do or die Game 7 in Boston on Saturday, forward Tyler Bertuzzi was already focused on getting under the Bruins’ skins. When asked about his rivals, Bertuzzi decided to comment on their demeanour and claimed that the dressing room is frustrated at this point in the series.

“Maybe a little bit. Obviously, I think everyone’s frustrated over there,” Bertuzzi said. “We’ve been very good defensively in kind of smothering them and we got to bring that to Game 7.”

Bertuzzi may feel he knows the players in the Bruins’dressing room better than his teammates after playing in Boston for a brief stint last season. His answer came when asked specifically about Bruins’ captain Brad Marchand and if he feels he’s been able to frustrate the Bruins’ well-known pest over the past couple of games.

Clearly, Bertuzzi feels he’s be causing frustration in the entire Bruins’ dressing room and wanted to remind them ahead of Game 7 on Saturday.

I’m not sure who the Bruins are more frustrated with, whether it is Bertuzzi or themselves. The team was only able to generate one shot in the entire first frame and will need to find a way to get back the Maple Leafs’ shot blocking attempts in order to find the back of the net.

When Marchand was asked about the mindset ahead of Saturday’s do or die game, the captain did not sound frustrated.

“Again, it’s an opportunity. You never know how things play out in these moments, but they’re exciting. We have to be grateful for it. We’ve worked extremely hard to put ourselves in a position to have home ice and it’s a great opportunity.

“It doesn’t matter how anything’s played out in the past. It doesn’t matter how we got to this point. It’s about the next one.”

The winner of the Maple Leafs-Bruins series will take on the Florida Panthers , who have been watching this unfolded after beating the Tampa Bay Lightning 4-1 in that series, in the second round.

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