DETROIT - When Henrik Zetterberg arrived to the Olympics in February, his back was such a mess that he had already missed a dozen regular season games and was on medication to keep the swelling down. He probably shouldn't have played. But he gave it a try anyway, because he was the captain and because the team needed him.
In the first game, he scored in a 4-2 win against the Czech Republic. And then he couldn't take the pain anymore.
'It was tough,' said Boston Bruins forward Loui Eriksson, who was a member of the Swedish team. 'He was definitely our best player. He played the first game and then it was tough to see him. He [stayed] in his room after.'
Ten weeks later, after Zetterberg underwent surgery for a herniated disc, the Detroit Red Wings captain returned to the lineup for Game 4 of the playoffs. He might have been rushing it. But he was the captain and the team needed him.
With Zetterberg back, the Red Wings played perhaps their best game of the series. And yet, it was still not enough, as the Bruins erased a two-goal lead and won 3-2 with 6:28 remaining in overtime on a goal that deflected in off Jarome Iginla.
Boston, which leads the best-of-seven series 3-1, is now one more win away from meeting the Montreal Canadiens in the Atlantic Division final.
'Obviously it was fun to be back,' said Zetterberg, who was on the ice for both Detroit goals. 'It would have been a lot more fun if we got the W. But now, we're just going to go to Boston.'
Now, the real desperation kicks in. If the Red Wings did not already have their backs against the wall, they do now. The Bruins, meanwhile, will try to learn from their first-round scare a year ago and try to finish off Detroit in Game 5 on Saturday night.
'We'll load up and we'll be ready,' said Iginla, who wore the old-school hockey jacket given to the Bruins' player of the game. 'We want to close it out. We're not taking anything for granted. It's always that last game, historically, that's the toughest.'
This one was not exactly easy. And for that, the Bruins have Zetterberg to blame.
Head coach Mike Babcock had cautioned about expecting too much out of a player who had not played a game since Feb. 12. If he brought leadership and a calming presence to a young team that had looked overwhelmed at times in the series, it would be enough.
Still, Zetterberg played like someone who was deep into a playoff drive. He even had the beard to go along with it. On his first shift, he found Pavel Datsyuk for a partial breakaway. Minutes later, he uncorked a shot from the slot that Tuukka Rask got a piece of. But as the game wore on, fatigue started to set in and Boston mounted a comeback.
'I've played a lot better before [the injury],' said Zetterberg. 'I think I felt good in the first and the second, then I started to have a lot of short shifts. But that's the way it is. I had to have this first game.'
'Well, he's been out for two months and I still thought he was one of our best players,' said Red Wings defenceman Niklas Kronwall. 'That says a lot about him as a player and as a person.'
Zetterberg was not the only roster change for Game 4.
Jonas Gustavsson replaced a Jimmy Howard in net after the Red Wings starting goalie took the warm-up and then could not play because of the flu. Despite playing in his first career playoff game, he looked solid in making 37 saves. Todd Bertuzzi also made his debut in this year's playoffs, because the team needed more veteran experience.
For the most part, the moves paid off.
This was a different Detroit team than had played in the previous two games. The Red Wings pushed the pace, controlled the puck and were unafraid to attack the middle of the ice. They played with confidence and neutralized the Bruins' strength with speed.
'Yeah, we didn't have much in that first period,' said Bruins head coach Claude Julien. 'I just told our guys we had to get back to our game.'
Midway through the fist period, Bertuzzi set a screen in front of the net as Kronwall scored a power play goal to give Detroit a 1-0 lead on the same day that he became a father. In the second period, Kronwall stripped Milan Lucic of the puck and then caught a pass from Justin Abdelkader, before wheeling around the net and setting up Datsyuk for a goal, whose wife gave birth a day earlier, then tapped in a pass from Kronwall in the second as the Red Wings went up 2-0.
The Bruins never quit though. They finished checks and tried to take the game into the alley, where they are their most dangerous. Brad Marchand, who missed a wide-open net in the first period and again in the third, at one point followed Zetterberg around the ice and needled him with tiny slashes in an attempt to throw him off his game.
Eventually, the game started to swing Boston's way.
At 10:14 in the second period, Torey Krug blasted a point shot that was redirected past Gustavsson. The Bruins, smelling blood, then tied the game 75 seconds into the third period when a wide-open Milan Lucic forced overtime from in front of the net.
'I don't know if they were out of energy or they got a little discouraged when they couldn't score on Tuukka,' said Dougie Hamilton, who assisted on the overtime winner. 'For us, we just kept focusing.'
In overtime, Detroit's Justin Abdelkader was stopped on a breakaway in the first few minutes. But the Bruins, who outshot the Red Wings 12-3 in the extra frame, kept coming in waves. And at 13:32, Hamilton had his shot pinball off three bodies before going in.
'I was just trying to get a stick on it and tip it and it went by [Lucic] and the guy he was battling' said Iginla. 'It's a pretty fortunate goal, a fortunate bounce, an ugly one. But that's how most of those are in OT.'
Post By http://sports.nationalpost.com/2014/04/24/boston-bruins-edge-detroit-red-wings-in-ot-take-3-1-series-lead/
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