Take Some Time To Appreciate The Beauty Of Bruins' Overtime Goal In Ottawa

By Michael Hurley, CBS Boston

BOSTON (CBS) -- Sunday was a busy day in sports, as are most Sundays during the NFL season. And in New England in particular, with the Patriots stealing eyeballs throughout the afternoon, it's possible that some angry sports fans went for long, frustrated walks with the dog and therefore missed all or parts of the Bruins game. Still more sports fans might have actually decided to get off the couch and (shudder) accomplish some task and get some things done before the week began.

While such behavior is perfectly acceptable for a Sunday in December, it's worth taking some time before it's too late to appreciate the sheer beauty that was the Bruins' overtime goal in Ottawa early Sunday evening.

As the headline and the previous sentence notes, this was not an individual player's goal. This has been described thus far as a "Bruins goal" because it was both the peak of elegance and the perfect picture of teamwork. It was, simply, art.

Just look at the possession leading up to the goal. Watch as David Krejci carries the puck into the zone, skates up the wall, and drops a pass back to Torey Krug. Watch as Krug, with Krejci circling back to the blue line, drops another pass, this one to Brad Marchand. Watch as the Bruins' trio skates a perfect circle in the Ottawa zone, before Marchand decides to pull up at the right dot.

There, Marchand gently gives the puck to Krejci, who carries the puck behind the net, but not before ever-so-subtly faking a burst toward the near post. That crafty, slight fake was enough to get goaltender Mike McKenna slightly off his mark. Krejci then wrapped around the net and delivered a pass -- oh, the sauce on that pass -- to Krug, who had broken his stride to take up residence near the right post. Krug one-timed the perfect pass, and the Bruins skated away with a 2-1 victory to cap off a marvelous weekend of hockey.

Just watch it. Watch it!

Watch it again!

Admire the sauce! And the finish!

The stick-handling. Admire it at full speed!

Folks.

That is a beautiful ice hockey goal. There's just no two ways about it.

And, as previously stated, it put an exclamation point on an encouraging weekend of hockey from the Bruins. They had entered the weekend on a three-game losing skid, and they had been 3-4-1 overall in December. Things were trending in a bad direction, which wasn't spectacular news, considering the high-powered Maple Leafs were visiting on Saturday night. The Bruins thumped the Leafs, 6-3 on Saturday, and finished the weekend strong with the 2-1 overtime win on the road.

That victory came from a team result, with notable contributions from Tuukka Rask, who stopped 27 shots, and Marchand, who scored the Bruins' other goal on a power play:

What was unequivocally better than that goal was Marchand's stroll past the Ottawa bench afterwards:

In many ways, it was a perfect Marchand game. He took an elbowing penalty, scored a goal, stared down an entire opposing bench, and helped set up a gorgeous game-winning sequence.

Speaking of which: Watch that goal again. It's beautiful!

You can email Michael Hurley or find him on Twitter @michaelFhurley.

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• Boston Bruins
• NHL
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• Brad Marchand