Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Will Boston make significant changes if they lose Game 7?

Tuukka Rask

TORONTO, CANADA - MAY 12: Phil Kessel #81 of the Toronto Maple Leafs celebrates Dion Phaneuf goal against Tuukka Rask #40 of the Boston Bruins in Game Six of the Eastern Conference Quarterfinals during the 2013 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs May 12, 2013 at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. (Photo by Abelimages/Getty Images)

If the Boston Bruins cough up a 3-1 series lead and are ultimately eliminated by the Toronto Maple Leafs, will that significantly change the Bruins’ gameplan going into the summer?

Could we see significant moves in an attempt to shakeup the squad after what would be their second straight first-round exit? Is Bruins coach Claude Julien’s job even on the line?

Julien won the Stanley Cup with Boston in 2011 and that recent success will almost certainly be a major consideration if the Bruins’ season ends tonight. At the same time, Julien hasn’t been without his strong critics lately.

Retired NHL star forward Tony Amonte doesn’t understand why Julien hasn’t shaken up his lines in an effort to spark a team that has just two goals in their last two games.

“There is not another coach in the NHL that wouldn’t have changed his lines by now,” Amonte told CSN New England. “You have to change it up. You have to spark something offensively. Let’s look at the Pittsburgh Penguins, Game 6, against the Islander. Their top line - Dupois, Crosby, Kunitz - they split them up. They were the best line in the NHL all regular season until Crosby got hurt. They scored every game ... and they change it up.”

Meanwhile, Julien isn’t happy with the team’s inconsistency in 2013 and went as far as to call them a “Jekyll & Hyde hockey club,” perhaps lending fuel to the argument that serious changes need to come from a player perspective if this team can’t win when their season is at stake.

Mike Felger and Kevin Paul Dupont discussed the subject below: