Boston -- Live by Tim Thomas or die by Thomas. Boston fans can’t have it both ways. If he annoys you because he creeps too far out of the crease then you have to deal with that because he does make the impossible save possible. For every goal that a fan may deem “soft” he stops 3 or 4 that could have been sure goals. It’s the way that he plays the game and he’s not going to change.

“I have a pretty good idea of how to play goalie,” said the 2009 Vezina trophy winner. “I’m not going to be taking suggestions or advice at this time (smiling). I’m just going to keep playing the way I have.”

Going into Game 3 his GAA was 2.27 in the playoffs after 20 games played. So he will never be the problem (he stopped 40 tonight and his save in the splits with 1:05 left in the first period really set the tone in a scoreless first period. He has gotten his team to this point and unless they score more than two goals every two games they are going to be eliminated pretty quickly. Problem solved with their 8-goal outburst? Maybe.

The Bruins had to stop having these horrendous turnovers that put their netminder in a bad position. They have to continue to use the body, Zdeno Chara especially, and they have to put more shots on Vancouver’s Roberto Luongo. If he faces more than 35 shots he’s vulnerable for sure (as I pointed out in a previous article). Sure enough the B’s got 38 shots and walked away with the win.

The games had been tight so the offense had to step up for the B’s. They needed some dirty goals. They had to be able to convert some rebounds. They had to get some rebounds. Getting Luongo moving was the key.

“We’re not going to quit. We know it’s still early in the series and it’s all on tonight,” Michael Ryder said before Game 3. “We’ve got to take it as a do or die situation and we’ve got to come out hard, and make sure we set the momentum early.”

It took a lot of years for the Bruins to become relevant again in their city. Just five year’s ago most of the local population was so focused on the Red Sox and the Patriots because of their success. Now they have the town’s attention so a little success at home could go a long way in gaining some of their swagger back. This Game 3 win will help but they need another to really get people believing they can win this thing. That would even up the series 2-2.

This game got very chippy. The Aaron Rome hit on Nathan Horton was dirty and when the Bruins forward hit his head on the ice it was scary. He will be ok, and that’s a relief. It seems like that got Boston to play like a team once again and the nastiness should carry over into Game 3.

“It gave us some extra motivation to win it tonight, kind of like do it for him,” Brad Marchand said about his fallen teammate. “Hopefully he will be fine. Our coach wasn’t too happy about that (the finger pointing that Milan Lucic and others did to Alex Burrows)….after the game he said he didn’t want to see that anymore.”

A long time ago the Bruins were #1 in the hearts and minds of the inhabitants of this fine city, if they have a bit more success in the 2011 Stanley Cup Finals then the town will start talking about them again, especially since the Red Sox are out of town playing in the Yankees in New York.

*photo by del Tufo