The Boston Bruins will look to end their record-setting season with a Stanley Cup victory, but first, they must get through the strongest collection of teams in recent memory. The Eastern Conference is stacked, and Boston’s quest for another championship before players like Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci possibly retire starts when the Bruins clash with the Florida Panthers in the first round of the playoffs. To get a sense of each team's strengths and weaknesses, let's take a closer look at their respective statistics and compare them head-to-head.
Here's a tale of the tape for the upcoming series:
On the surface, this series is a good example of how deep the Eastern Conference is. The Boston Bruins just finished with the most wins and points in regular season history and the Florida Panthers won the Presidents’ Trophy last season, but the Bruins are detailed group that plays the game right way, while the Panthers are a one-dimensional team that doesn’t pay enough mind to defense.