WATCH: Brad Marchand messes with Connor Bedard in Bruins-Blackhawks game
It turns out that Bruins winger and new team captain Brad Marchand was being brutally honest with all of us when he said that wearing the ‘C’ for the Bruins wasn’t going to change his game.
Not that anybody had reason to doubt him on that front, of course, but Marchnd’s play in training camp and the preseason had already confirmed that he was going to be full tilt all the time. And wearing the ‘C’ for the first time Wednesday night against the Blackhawks (Marchand admitted that it didn’t hit the same wearing it in the preseason), Marchand decided to bring his own unique brand of intensity and downright pestering behavior to Blackhawks superstar Connor Bedard.
In fact, Marchand did what he could to straight-up drag Bedard into the Boston bench.
Brad Marchand trying to get under the skin of Connor Bedard after the No. 1 overall pick scored his first career NHL goal. #Blackhawks pic.twitter.com/bcsPwWOCfY
— Charlie Roumeliotis (@CRoumeliotis) October 12, 2023
Marchand even got an added boost from Charlie Coyle, who tried to stick his hip into Bedard to keep him pinned into the Boston bench and unable to get off the ice or return to the play.
Considering that this was in the immediate aftermath of Bedard’s goal to make it 1-0 for the Blackhawks — and in what ended as a 3-1 victory for the Bruins — this was nothing more than the new-look, new-attitude Bruins giving the 19-year-old a “welcome to the show, kid.” And from one of the game’s most accomplished and notorious irritants.
And what makes it classic Marchand is that it also came just hours after Marchand was relatively mum when asked about Bedard following the Black and Gold’s morning skate at Warrior Ice Arena, with the B’s captain outright saying that Bedard was a great player and that “you leave him alone.” (Maybe that should’ve been our first sign that Marchand was going to do something to try and take the already-sensational talent off his game.)
Brad Marchand got asked about Connor Bedard today. pic.twitter.com/ddCvaWl0OK
— Ty Anderson (@_TyAnderson) October 11, 2023
Marchand wasn’t alone in his pestering of Bedard, though it came in different fashions from the rest of Boston’s roster, with Brandon Carlo flustering Bedard with countless poke checks that disrupted his flow and ability to get great looks, and with Hampus Lindholm proving to be an absolute thorn in his side throughout what was a 10-minute head-to-head.
It was a pestering that was absolutely necessary, too, with Bedard’s talent sticking out to the Bruins.
“He’s a really good hockey player,” Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery said of Bedard. “You know, I thought we were aware of him, but I don’t think our checking is where it needed to be no matter who it is.”
The checking may not have been at the appropriate level for what the Bruins want to slow down a talent like Bedard. But the irking? That was already in midseason form, and led by their content factory of a captain.