Once the most promising young talent on the Boston Bruins, Patrice Bergeron's career was put in jeopardy last fall after a cheap-shot by the Flyers' Randy Jones. Bergeron missed the rest of the season and playoffs after the severe concussion and it wasn't until training camp this season that he fully returned to the ice.
He came into yesterday's game against the Hurricanes with four goals and 14 assists. His goal-scoring tough has clearly not been the same but Bergeron was slowly returning to the player he had been for a few seasons.
The B's (23-5-4) beat the Hurricanes (15-13-5), 4-2, at the Garden but unfortunately the lasting image from the game was Bergeron laying face down on the ice once again.
In the second period, he got hurt on a collision with a Carolina defenseman and it took him a few minutes to recover (possibly regain consciousness?) and get off the ice with help from teammates and the trainers.
It did not look good at first glance and with his concussion history, let's just hope that Bergeron somehow didn't get another serious head injury.
With Bergeron probably out for the near future and Marco Sturm recently placed on IR, the Bruins' injury list grows by the day. Aaron Ward and Andrew Ferrance are also out yet the team keeps winning.
Joni Pitkanen (Rod Brind'Amour, Joe Corvo) scored a power play goal at 4:50 of the first to give the Hurricanes an early 1-0 lead.
Marc Savard (Phil Kessel, Milan Lucic) tied it up with his 10th of the season in the second period.
3:54 into the third, David Krejci (Vladimir Sobotka, Shane Hnidy) put the B's up for good with a goal, his 12th of the season. Eight minutes later, tough guy Shawn Thornton (2nd of the year) gave Boston a 3-1 lead.
With less than five minutes left, Ray Whitney scored from Brind'Amour and Scott Walker but Stephane Yelle put in an empty-netter with three seconds left.
The Bruins have now won their last 13 home games. Goaltender Manny Fernandez made 32 saves and improved his record to 10-2-1.
Boston travels to St. Louis tonight for a rare Sunday night contest.
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