BOSTON -- Casey DeSmith said that he was in "uncharted territory."
It was late in the first period and the game was still scoreless in the Winter Classic matchup between the Penguins and Bruins at Fenway Park. Tristan Jarry, who had stopped all eight shots he had faced to that point, had pulled himself from the game and exited through the Fenway Park dugout after suffering an undisclosed lower-body injury early in the period. It's not totally clear what Jarry's injury is or how exactly it happened, but it was evident for several minutes at that point that Jarry was dealing with something, given some of his awkward movements in the crease.
DeSmith, seeing what was transpiring, stood from his stool on the Penguins' bench and began moving around. Once a TV timeout came, Jarry skated over to Penguins athletic trainer Chris Stewart and had a brief conversation before exiting the game and clearing the way for DeSmith to come in for a relief appearance.
DeSmith played the remaining 4:30 of the first period and the final two periods of the game, and put forth a strong showing in the Penguins' 2-1 loss to the Bruins, stopping 19 of 21 shots.
"It's tough to lose a guy that early in a game like that," Mike Sullivan said of Jarry. "But I thought Casey competed hard in there for us. It was obviously a really competitive hockey game. It was an even game. There's a fine line between winning and losing. We ended up on the wrong side of it tonight."
DeSmith said that it's been around a decade since he played a game outside.
"Jumping in cold to an outdoor game definitely carries a few more challenges than a regular game," he said.
The lighting and sightlines are some of those challenges that impact a goaltender, and DeSmith noted that it was more difficult to fight through traffic. The Bruins, of course, posed a massive challenge themselves as the league's top team and highest-scoring team.
"Everything felt a little more on top of me today," DeSmith said. "I don't know if that was a product of them going to the net hard or the outdoor rink, but everything was a bit different. ... They're a great team. They know how to win games. Down a goalie, we knew that they were going to come hard. We just didn't quite get the bounces tonight."
Despite the challenges, Jake Guentzel said DeSmith was "unbelievable" in the surprise relief appearance.
"That's a tough situation to come into that," Guentzel added. "But he played amazing and gave us a chance to win. Disappointed we couldn't get it done for him."
There likely won't be an update on Jarry's status until the Penguins' practice on Wednesday in Las Vegas. If Jarry's injury does keep him out for any amount of time, DeSmith is looking forward to the challenge of assuming the No. 1 role for the time being.
"I was always ready for the challenge," DeSmith said. "Obviously, you hope Tristan is OK, we don't know his status yet. We're wishing him the best. I feel really good about my game right now. I'm not super concerned with the fact that it might be my net, I'm excited for the challenge."
MORE FROM THE GAME
• Usually if a visiting goaltender leaves a game, the team uses the local emergency backup goaltender that also serves the home team, but they aren't required to. The Penguins actually brought their own emergency backup goaltender Mike Chiasson to Boston, which wasn't that unusual given the circumstances. Chiasson has been filling in fairly regularly in practices as of late just to ease the workloads of Jarry and DeSmith, and the Penguins practiced at Fenway Park on Sunday. Chiasson came out in full gear for the second and third periods and sat in the Penguins' dugout, far from the bench, staying ready in the event he was needed and watching the game. NHL rules prohibit emergency backups from sitting on the actual bench.
• If Jarry is unable to play on the rest of this road trip, there's no doubt in my mind that Dustin Tokarski gets the recall from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. For one, Filip Lindberg was injured just before the holiday break and remains week-to-week with a lower-body injury, and the only other option is Taylor Gauthier, who was recalled from Wheeling to Wilkes-Barre and made his AHL debut on New Year's Eve and stopped 29 of 30 shots in a win. Even if Lindberg were healthy, Tokarski has simply been the better goaltender and one of the best in the entire AHL this season. He's top-five in the league in both goals-against average (2.22) and save percentage (.926).
• It was Kasperi Kapanen who broke the scoreless tie at the 8:40 mark of the middle frame, finishing a play off a forecheck from Danton Heinen and Jeff Carter that ended with Heinen setting up Kapanen for a quick chance just off to the side of the right post:
"It was pretty surreal," Kapanen said of the moment. "Some players go without playing in any of these. I've been lucky to get two. Just an amazing atmosphere out there."
• The Penguins carried their one-goal lead into the first intermission. Bruins' first-line right winger Jake DeBrusk tied the game in the third period just after a Bruins power play came to an end, and then DeBrusk again gave the Bruins the lead with a shot that came off of a rebound from Taylor Hall's shot. Danny Shirey has more on the Penguins slowing down in the second half of this game here.
• Evgeni Malkin nearly tied it in the final seconds of the game. That was the subject of tonight's Freeze Frame.
• The Penguins dressed seven defensemen and 11 forwards this game -- Chad Ruhwedel returned from injury on defense, and Ryan Poehling came out of the lineup due to an undisclosed injury. The Penguins didn't have to dress the lineup they did -- Drew O'Connor could have been the 12th forward, and one of the defensemen could have sat. I asked Sullivan about the decision after the game and he confirmed it was a coaching decision not necessitated by injury, but didn't want to get into specifics as to why when I pushed for an explanation. "We have a lot of reasons why we did what we did," Sullivan told me. "I'm not going to share them all with you. We chose to go with 11 forwards and seven defensemen tonight for a number of reasons."
• The power play went 0-for-3, after going 0-for-9 last game against the Devils on Friday. Guentzel was asked what needs to happen to get the power play back on track.
"I'm not sure," he said. "It's just that hockey's a funny game like that, where bounces go your way. We just have to go out confident over the boards and try to take over the game next time."
• Ty Smith quarterbacked the top power play unit for the second game in a row.
• Conditions were pretty alright in the game, with temperatures around the high-40s with some clouds and no rain. The sun glare off the ice was a little bit of an issue early on, and Guentzel noted during warmups in a TNT interview that the ice felt "sticky." Guentzel said after the game that the ice ended up being fine, and the puck moved well.
• Jan Rutta led the team with five blocked shots. That's a season-high for him and ties his personal record for the most blocked shots in a game, last accomplished on Jan. 14, 2018, his rookie season.
• Kris Letang, who was already sidelined with a lower-body injury, returned to Montreal to spend some time with his family following the recent death of his father.
• Attendance was was 39,243, a sellout.
• Really cool touches throughout Fenway Park for this. The hand-operated scoreboards on the Green Monster included all Atlantic Division standings as well as the out-of-town scores for the other NHL games on Monday.
• The NHL announced prior to the game that next year's Winter Classic will be the Golden Knights and Kraken at Seattle's T-Mobile Park, the home of the Seattle Mariners.
• Zero press box snacks during the game to review. The pregame meal did have pretty great hot dogs and big chocolate chip cookies, at least.
THE ESSENTIALS
• Boxscore
• Live file
• Scoreboard
• Standings
• Statistics
THE HIGHLIGHTS
THE THREE STARS
As selected at Fenway Park:
1. Jake DeBrusk, Bruins RW
2. Linus Ullmark, Bruins G
3. Brad Marchand, Bruins LW
THE INJURIES
• Defenseman Jeff Petry remained sidelined with the left wrist injury he suffered in the Penguins' game against the Sabres on Dec. 10. He's resumed skating on his own but only uses his right hand on a shortened stick so far, not his injured left wrist.
• Forward Josh Archibald missed his sixth game with an undisclosed lower-body injury sustained in the Penguins' game in Raleigh, N.C. on Dec. 18. He has not resumed practicing with the team.
• Defenseman Kris Letang missed his second game with a lower-body injury sustained in the Penguins' game Dec. 28 against the Red Wings and remains day-to-day. He is also away from the team right now following the death of his father.
• Forward Ryan Poehling missed this game with an undisclosed injury. It's not clear what the injury is, but he did have a nagging upper-body injury through most of December.
THE LINEUPS
Sullivan’s lines and pairings:
Jake Guentzel - Sidney Crosby - Bryan Rust
Jason Zucker - Evgeni Malkin - Rickard Rakell
Brock McGinn - Teddy Blueger - Jeff Carter
Danton Heinen - Kasperi Kapanen
Marcus Pettersson - Jan Rutta
P.O Joseph - Mark Friedman
Brian Dumoulin - Ty Smith/Chad Ruhwedel
And for Jim Montgomery's Bruins:
Brad Marchand - Patrice Bergeron - Jake DeBrusk
Pavel Zacha - David Krejci - David Pastrnak
Taylor Hall - Charlie Coyle - Trent Frederic
Nick Foligno - Tomas Nosek - Craig Smith
Matt Grzelcyk - Charlie McAvoy
Hampus Lindholm - Brandon Carlo
Derek Forbort - Connor Clifton
THE SCHEDULE
The Penguins' road trip continues with a two-game swing out west. They'll practice in Las Vegas on Wednesday, then play the Golden Knights on Thursday and the Coyotes on Sunday. Danny Shirey will handle that trip for us.
THE CONTENT
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