It's easy to see the impact Pat Maroon has had on the Bruins bench.
The veteran winger, who has his name engraved on three Stanley Cups, could be seen patting his linemates on the back and offering words of encouragement to steady them during the chaos of playoff hockey.
And, of course, there's the footage of Saturday night when the 6-foot-3, 234-pound bruiser threw Toronto defenseman Timothy Liljegren onto Boston's bench, shocking an already enthusiastic TD Garden crowd. .
Postseason grit and aggressive on-ice approach are two valuable commodities as the calendar turns to April.
And in his first playoff appearance wearing a black-and-gold sweater, Maroon proved why Boston wanted him in their latest Cup game.
“There's a lot of emotion coming through, especially with the crowd being so engaged,” Jim Montgomery said of the atmosphere the Maroons have on the ice. “The way he plays, I mean, that’s what he’s good at – making subtle plays that build the team’s game.
“And what he's really good at is off the bench. What we've noticed is that he's a lot like Nick Foligno, a lot of positive talk and reinforcing the game plan.”
Building on the Maroons' approach against the Maple Leafs in Game 1, the Bruins' strategy Saturday was to welt as much as possible against their Original Six opponent. On a night when Boston totaled 51 hits against Toronto, Maroon led the way with six hits in 11 minutes, 28 seconds of ice time.
Maroon's knack for dropping opposing skaters with bone-crushing checks and right hooks is well-documented. But the Bruins didn't just add Maroon to the roster as a physical deterrent.
“I think his ability to hang on to the puck on the ice, his ability to make plays, is incredibly underrated,” Montgomery said of the Maroons' game before this first-round series began. “A lot of people talk about Maroon and his fisticuffs, for lack of a better word. To me, he's a hockey player. He's won three Cups because he's a hockey player.”
Maroon made an immediate impact on his first shift during Saturday's game. Corralling the puck near the boards, Maroon found himself in the crosshairs of Leafs scrapper Ryan Reaves and 6-foot-5 blueliner Joel Edmundson.
Most NHLers probably threw the puck into no-man's land to avoid the heat, or crashed into the glass and coughed up a biscuit. Of course, Maroon isn't as athletic as most of his NHLers.
With two skaters drawn toward him, Maroon instead turned the puck over and passed it to linemate Jesper Boqvist, who took off on the other side of the ice. The Leafs only had one skater back as Boqvist and Johnny Beecher pushed the puck toward Ilya Samsonov while Reeves and Edmundson tried to beat the Maroons.
Seconds later, Beecher tipped a feed from Boqvist into the net, giving Boston the lead with the team's first shot of the night just 2:26 into the game.
“There's a reason this guy has three Cups,” Beecher said of Maroon. “He knows how to play the right way. He knows how to manage the match. He was great for me and the Boks, slowing down the pace of the game and giving us little bits of advice here and there.” He played unbelievably. Without him, the goal would not have happened.”
Maroon may not be a top-six player at this stage of his career. However, it is no coincidence that the 35-year-old won three consecutive cup titles between 2019 and 2021.
The Bruins expect him to add a fourth ring in the final game of his NHL career.
“He played great tonight with his first goal,” Marchand said of the Maroons. “So he understands the importance of the little plays that make a difference in a game, and he understands that and holds his players accountable.
“It's not easy to show up on deadline and act like one and be confident in the room, but he's able to do that because of his experience. It makes a big difference.”
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