Montgomery: Bergeron 'Feeling Better' But 'Questionable' for Game 2

BOSTON - Patrice Bergeron is 'feeling better' but remains 'questionable' for Wednesday night's Game 2 against the Florida Panthers, per coach Jim Montgomery. The Bruins captain did not skate with the team during an optional practice on Tuesday morning at Warrior Ice Arena.
While Bergeron was not on the ice for Boston's Game 1 victory, his presence was still felt inside the dressing room. The 19-year NHL veteran was watching the game from the coaches' office and providing feedback to the staff and players in between periods.

"He's one of the best in the league so it's great he can give you tips even if he wasn't playing last game. He was there. He was talking to me when I had some questions…it's great to have him there," said Pavel Zacha, who subbed in for Bergeron as the B's top-line center.
"He talked to me a little bit. I told him I hadn't played playoffs in a while and he was just calming me down, 'have fun there, just battle hard.' I had a couple questions with face-offs and stuff like that that can help me in a game.
"He has so much knowledge and it's nice that he likes to share it and he wants to make everyone else around him better. It's great to have a player like that around the team."
Montgomery added that Bergeron's hockey IQ is "off the charts…off the charts" and that he learns from his captain every game.
"He'll say something on the bench, and I'll say, 'I should start talking about that now,'" said Montgomery. "He doesn't get rattled by anything. He promotes positivity - cool, calm, confidence - that I think permeates through the room. We keep him involved. Like [Monday night], we're having him in the coaches' room, 'what are you seeing?'
"He's in the dressing room talking to the players about what he's seeing so that gives the players confidence. He has a huge presence with us even if he's not on the ice."

Zacha Fills In

With Bergeron sidelined, Montgomery had no hesitations with putting Zacha into the No. 1 center hole. In his eyes, the 26-year-old, who is coming off a career-high 21-goal, 57-point campaign, has more than earned his shot at moving up in the lineup.
"I think No. 1 is how hard he competes with skill on puck," Montgomery said of what Zacha has done well to take strides this season. "He wins a lot of battles for us now. He kills a lot of plays. He wins battles, protects pucks, makes plays. To me, it's how hard he is with his skill and his ability on pucks. He wants to be first on pucks. Because of that, it just helps build our team game."
Zacha's confidence has only grown throughout the season after being put in situations to succeed, helping to complement players like David Krejci and David Pastrnak on a regular basis.
"Coming to a new team and everything, knowing that I'm probably gonna get an opportunity that I wanted and taking advantage of it is big for me," he said. "There's so many things that I can get better at. Playoffs is here now and I'm trying to prove that I can be a playoff player and it doesn't stop at one game."
The task of going toe to toe with Florida stalwart Aleksander Barkov and the Panthers' top line certainly won't get any easier as the series progresses.
"I was assigned the Barkov line there with Marchy and JD," said Zacha. "It was just two lines against each other. Plus/minus, you always want to win that battle. That's the exciting part for me is to be in those positions and play against those lines."

Hall Feeling Good

Montgomery termed Taylor Hall as "one of our better players" in Game 1 as the veteran winger created a handful of strong chances, including two 2-on-1 rushes with Trent Frederic, who was denied by stellar saves from Panthers goalie Alex Lyon on both attempts.
"I thought his details and habits were excellent," said Montgomery. "And then you combine that with his speed, it creates mismatches for us. Three chances all came from real good D-zone plays by him that led to offensive chances. One was by him, two were by Freddy."
Hall said that being able to return from his lower-body injury in time to play a few regular-season games as tune-ups for the playoffs helped him immensely.
"Just the pace, the timing of the game and, honestly, to get into those games and make mistakes and put yourself in spots that you don't want to be in and correct those and have three days to kind of look back on the video and make some corrections to my game was really valuable," said Hall. "That's what I tried to do. I knew those three games if I could get myself in a pretty good spot for Game 1, I was happy I was able to do that."

Making Adjustments

While the Bruins are pleased to be leading the series, 1-0, they know there is room for improvement, particularly when it comes to adjusting to the Panthers' relentless forechecking game.
"They've done a really good job in their last 20 games of being committed to the forecheck and running really good routes and putting good pressure on you," said Montgomery. "I don't think there's an area we need to improve, but also think we weren't very clean and crisp offensively. Not only on breakouts but in the neutral zone and the offensive zone. I thought our defensive game was good; I thought our offensive game was real slow and a little lethargic."
Montgomery added that the Bruins must continue to try to keep Barkov at bay - which, of course, is no easy task. The Panthers' top centerman was held without a shot on goal in 19:51 of ice time in Game 1.
"I just think [Hampus] Lindholm and Brando [Carlo] did a really good job of having great gaps against that line," said Montgomery. "I don't look at it as a Barkov thing, I look at it like a line. [Carter] Verhaeghe has 40 goals. And for the most part, we did a really good job.
"All together we did a really good job, the way we tracked…we only gave up seven Grade-A chances. That's gonna put you in a good position to win a lot of hockey games. Unfortunately, we didn't get many more ourselves. That's where we look at where we need to improve our game."
When it comes to taming Matthew Tkachuk, who scored the Panthers' lone goal in Game 1, Montgomery said the Bruins must do their best to trap the 25-year-old in his own end as much as possible.
"I don't think anything changed with my opinion of Matthew Tkachuk after [Game 1]," said Montgomery. "I thought he was really good and I think he's a hell of a hockey player. He competes all over the ice. He gets to hard areas and that's the things that we look at. You're not gonna deter him because his compete level is so high.
"But you're going to be able to take good body position and make sure he doesn't beat you to the net front and try to take good angles so you can take away time and space. And you've got to try to make him defend. The more time he spends in his own end, the further he is away from making plays in your own end."