– by Adesina O. Koiki
A Lot of Sports Talk editor-in-chief
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DALLAS — If the Boston Bruins went about proving that their future is bright, there was no better advertisement of that than in the first period of Monday night’s game, when two of their rookies combined to make a little bit of history.
John Beecher and Mason Lohrei both scored their first NHL goals, done in a four-minute span of the opening period, as Boston defeated the Dallas Stars 3-2 inside American Airlines Center. Another young Bruins star, goalkeeper Jeremy Swayman, made 34 saves to thwart the comeback attempt of the Central Devision leaders.
Beecher, who scored at 10:21 of the first period, and Lohrei, who tallied at 14:09, became the first pair of Bruins’ rookies to score their first NHL goals in the same game since two current cornerstones of the franchise, Jake DeBrusk and Charlie McAvoy, scored in the season opener in Nashville in October 2017.
“That’s special. that’s something that’s going to get us rolling off right off the bat,” Swayman said about Beecher and Lohrei’s exploits. “They’re not even close to done yet.”
That said, it was one of the Bruins’ old heads, veteran Brad Marchand, who provided the winning goal for Boston on the power play at the 9:51 mark of the third to give the Bruins a 3-1 lead.
Both of the Stars’ goals came in the third period, with another young star-in-the-making type, 20-year-old Wyatt Johnston, getting the Stars on the board at 5:09 of the period to cut the Bruins’ lead to 2-1. With the net empty and the extra attacker on, Joe Pavelski once again scored on a trademark deflection, this time from a shot by Jason Robertson, to shave the deficit to one with 27.6 seconds remaining.
Stars defenseman Miro Heiskanen got off one last shot from the top of the left circle right before the buzzer sounded, but Swayman made his 34th and final stop to secure the two point for the Bruins.
*Editor’s note: Above the byline is the photo gallery from Monday evening’s game, with all photos taken by Dallas-area photographer Ross James. After clicking on the first photo to enlarge the picture, make sure to press the left and right arrow buttons to scroll through the rest of the pictures. There are 29 pictures in total.
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