Boston Bruins Tickets : The Bruins Qualified For The Playoffs For The Fifth Time In Nine Years

The Boston Bruins are a professional ice hockey team based in Boston, Massachusetts. They are members of the Northeast Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League (NHL).

The team has been in existence since 1924, entering the league as the first United States-based expansion franchise. They are also an Original Six team, along with the Toronto Maple Leafs, Detroit Red Wings, New York Rangers, Montreal Canadiens, and Chicago Blackhawks.

Boston currently has the second highest total of Stanley Cup championships won by an American team at five, with the Detroit Red Wings winning 11. Their home arena is the TD Garden, where they have played since 1995 after leaving the Boston Garden (which had been their home since 1928).

After the disappointing 2007 season, Lewis was fired as coach, and the Bruins announced on June 21, 2007, that former Canadiens head coach Claude Julien had been named as the new head coach. The Bruins also unveiled a new logo, and a brand new shoulder patch closely based on the main jersey logo used until 1932.

The 2008 campaign saw the Bruins regain some respectability, finishing 41/29/12 and making the playoffs. Despite many injuries, the Bruins pushed the top-seeded Canadiens to seven games in the first round of the playoffs before falling. Their performance, despite a 5-0 loss in the seventh game, rekindled interest in the team in New England, where the Bruins had for years been heavily overshadowed by the Red Sox, Patriots and Celtics.

After a slow start to the 2008/09 season, the Bruins won seventeen of their next twenty games leading many to see them as a revival of the "Big Bad Bruins" from the 1970s and '80s. During the 2009 All-Star Weekend's Skills Competition, captain Zdeno Chara fired the NHL's fastest measured "hardest shot" ever, with a clocked in speed of 105.4 mph (169.7 km/h) velocity.

The number of injured players in the season saw many call-ups from the Bruins' AHL Providence Bruins farm team, with rookie defenseman Matt Hunwick and forward Byron Bitz seeing success.

The Bruins went on to have the best record in the Eastern Conference and qualified for the playoffs for the fifth time in nine years, facing the Canadiens in the playoffs for the fourth time during that span, defeating them in a four game sweep before losing in seven games to the Carolina Hurricanes in the conference semifinals.

The 2009 summer off-season saw the departure of long-time defensive forward P.J. Axelsson from Sweden, who signed a multi-year contract with his hometown Frolunda HC team. With Maple Leafs G.M. Brian Burke threatening an offer sheet and Bruins management unable to meet his salary demands, forward Phil Kessel was traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs for a trio of future draft picks.

On January 1, 2010, the Bruins won the 2010 NHL Winter Classic over the Philadelphia Flyers in a 2-1 overtime decision at Fenway Park, thus becoming the first home team to win an outdoor classic game.

However, following the New Year's Day game, the Bruins, hobbled by injuries, would go through a five-week long period of lackluster play, with only two wins and compiling ten regulation losses earning them only eight points in the Eastern Conference standings in that 15-game long period, before breaking the losing streak in an away game against the Canadiens on February 7, with Tuukka Rask shutting out the Habs 3-0.

The win over the Canadiens was the first of four successive victories leading into the break in play for the NHL's participation in the 2010 Winter Olympics, and established Tuukka Rask as the number one goaltender for the Bruins, as Tim Thomas would only start eight of the 22 games remaining in the post-Olympic period of the season, with Rask winning eight of his post-Olympic starts, including two shutouts.

Thomas was on the silver-medal winning US team, with Patrice Bergeron on the gold-medal-winning Canadian team.

On April 13, 2010 the Boston Bruins received the second overall draft pick for the 2010 draft that was held in Los Angeles, CA at the Staples Center, selecting Tyler Seguin in the first round on June 25, 2010, with Greg Campbell and Nathan Horton joining the team, with Vladimir Sobotka and Dennis Wideman leaving the Bruins in the 2010 summer off-season.

After the season ended, Cam Neely was named on June 16, 2010 as the new team president of the Bruins.