Jeremy Swayman, Fraser Minten lift Bruins to 3-2 win over Capitals

Steve Conroy, Boston Herald on Mar 14, 2026

Published in Hockey

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The Boston Bruins may have played better games in their seven-game road losing streak than they did on Saturday in Washington. But results are all that matters at this time of the year and the B’s got the result they needed, finally.

Fraser Minten was the only player to score in a nine-round shootout to lift the B’s to a 3-2 victory over the Capitals and grab two important points in their first road win since January 17.

Jeremy Swayman was excellent, making 25 saves in regulation and overtime and then all nine Capital shooters in the skills competition to complete the season sweep over the Caps. Charlie McAvoy scored both goals for the B’s.

The B’s power-play woes continued as they went 0 for 4, including an anemic 5-on-3 and a PP at the end of the regulation that bled into OT. They are now 4 for 32 on the PP since the Olympic break. But their penalty kill did come up big.

Rasmus Sandin had broken a 1-1 tie at 3:12 of the third period. Tanner Jeannot tried to play the puck to himself along the boards but it went right to Sandin, who let a quick shot fly. It appeared that both Jeannot and Elias Lindholm deflected it with their sticks and found the upper corner over Swayman’s blocker arm.

The B’s were given the gift of a 39-second 5-on-3 but they never managed to even get a shot off, turning the puck over several times.

But the B’s tied it on McAvoy’s second goal of the game at 10:09. After a puck battle in the corner, the B’s won the puck and McAvoy went to the net to tip home Pavel Zacha’s shot past Logan Thompson.

Then things got hairy. Nikita Zadorov was called for boarding with 5:54 left in regulation and then, six seconds into the kill, they could have been down two men when Mark Kastelic’s clear went over the glass but it was ruled it deflected off the kick plate, which was the right play. Given the huge break, the B’s managed to kill off the Zadorov minor.

But then Hampus Lindholm was called for holding Justin Sourdif to prevent a Grade A scoring chance with 3:20 left in regulation and they were able to kill that as well.

The B’s got a power play of their own on a bad Connor McMichael interference penalty with 1:15 left in the third but they couldn’t capitalize in regulation, nor on the 4-on-3 in OT. Once McMichael came back, there was no stoppage in play so the balance of the OT was played out in a scoreless 4-on-4.

Then Swayman outlasted Thompson in the shootout.

Coach Marco Sturm made some pretty sizable line changes to start the game, plugging in rookie center Minten between David Pastrnak and Morgan Geekie to try and coax more production out of his big guns. Subsequently, Lindholm was dropped to center a third line with Jeannot and Marat Khusnutdinov while Mikey Eyssimont took Jeannot’s spot on the fourth line with Sean Kuraly and Kastelic.

“We just need a little bit more, not just out of David, just in general. Geeks, too. It’s a big man’s game right now, and those guys need to drive the bus,” Sturm told reporters in Washington. “And maybe it helps a guy like Elias, too, to realize he needs to get in different areas to be better, too.”

The moves didn’t lead to immediate offense for the B’s.

The two teams played a scoreless first period with the Caps getting the better of the chances. Swayman was forced to make several good saves, the best of which his denial of Timothy Liljegren’s one-timer from the middle of the slot.

The Caps held a 9-7 shot advantage and the hosts were gaining momentum late in the period.

It took Washington just 1:15 into the second period, thanks to a mistake by Khusnutdinov. The young Russian had lost his stick and headed to the bench. With the long change in the second, that gave right defenseman Matt Roy plenty of room to walk down from the point and blast a shot off the post and in.

The B’s got their first PP early in the second and it nearly blew up on them. Pastrnak was tripped by Aleksei Protas trying to break out of his own zone and it was let go by the officials, egregiously. That eventually led to a clean break-in by Sandin and it looked like he had Swayman beaten. But the netminder was able to extend his right pad for the save and keep it a one-goal game.

Swayman would stone Sandin again at 9:25 when he had an open look from the bottom of the left circle but he couldn’t beat Swayman with the wrister.

The B’s finally got a decent scoring chance when Pastrnak and Geekie had a 2-on-1 with about 11 minutes gone in the second. Pastrnak’s pass didn’t get through but he pounced on the loose puck and forced Thompson to make an excellent pad save.

But they did even it up at 11:57 on an ugly goal from McAvoy. Pastrnak’s pass was not in McAvoy’s one-timer wheelhouse but he manage to send a knuckling shot toward the net. Thanks to a Minten screen, Thompson never saw it and the puck made it through for McAvoy’s eighth of the year.

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