1978: The Bruins lose 3-2 to the Montreal Canadiens in overtime of Stanley Cup Final Game 2.

1999: The Bruins win 5-3 over the Buffalo Sabres in Game 5 of the conference semifinals.

2011: Hoping to improve after dropping Game 1 of the conference final to the Tampa Bay Lightning, the Bruins take in some practice and a few of them speak to the media about expectations for Game 2.

(This interview with Nathan Horton has a rather eerie foreshadowing question about whether he’s ever had an injury or concussion to try to battle through, which at the time he did not…)

Also, Patrice Bergeron is seen at full practice, giving his teammates hope for his speedy return to the ice.

Slovakia denied France the ability to complete le upset by beating them 5-4. France was in a position to possibly swipe fourth place in Group S away from Slovakia after narrowly beating Belarus in their penultimate preliminary game. They needed a regulation win against Slovakia to seal the deal, but Slovakia persevered and it’s au revoir France.

Not that France went quietly into the night: they came from behind to tie up the game three separate times, including ties before both intermissions. Chara did his part by contributing on the power play, sending one of his famous slap shots towards the net, where Michal Handzus deflected it in and made it 3-2 at the time. He also played nearly 25 minutes in this victory and surely must be pleased to see his team’s success after a lousy start to the tournament.

Better yet, a goal Slovakia had coming into Worlds was achieved. They have now secured a spot at the Sochi Olympics in 2014. (Other teams definitely set for Sochi include both Worlds hosts Finland and Sweden, plus Canada, the United States, Russia, Norway, Switzerland and the Czech Republic.) But with a quarterfinal match against Canada looming on May 17, it might be time for Slovakia to set some more goals–like maybe a 2012 medal?

The Czech Republic rebounded from their 2-0 shutout, and Krejci’s lack of production, to defeat Germany 8-1. Krejci, who was left off the score sheet entirely last time, turned around and had a three-point game, assisting on goals by Martin Erat and Miroslav Blatak while also scoring his own. He was also given a penalty shot when Christoph Schubert threw his stick–like when Alexander Ovechkin tried to befuddle Matt Duchene during the 2011 All-Star Game with his stick–but was denied. At that point, though, it didn’t matter: the Czechs already had all eight goals on the board.

The Czechs scored at even strength. They scored on the power play (four times). They scored shorthanded (once, Krejci’s goal). They showed that they’re hungry to earn another medal this year. Last year they had to settle for bronze, but maybe this year their sights are set a little higher. Now they face Sweden on May 17.

These games are going to proceed much, much faster than the preliminary round. All four quarterfinal games will be played on the same day. That night, we’ll know who’s going on to the two semifinal games on May 19. From there, the turnaround before the medal games isn’t much–May 20 will decide what teams get the medals and who will go home with fourth place.

Slovakia’s quarterfinal game will be shown on NBC Sports Network, although at 6 a.m. Eastern. Later on that day, they will also show America’s game with Finland. They have also promised to show at least one semifinal game, plus the medal games.

Read more articles from Emma Harger here.

1970: Wes Walz (full name Wesley Walz) is born in Calgary, Alberta. Drafted by the Bruins in 1989, he spent two years with the Bruins before going off to the Philadelphia Flyers. After that, even as part of the Calgary Flames and Detroit Red Wings organizations, he spent much of his time in the minors, never really cracking the NHL so much. In 1996 he quit the NHL altogether for Switzerland’s hockey league. But when the Minnesota Wild were setting up shop at the end of the ’90s, he returned to America and got in with them for their inaugural season. It was with the Wild that he had a career resurgence and he stayed with them until he retired in 2007. After retiring, he took a job as assistant coach of the Tampa Bay Lightning, mentoring Steven Stamkos, and though he was offered the gig as head coach of the Norfolk Admirals, he declined for family reasons.

1990: Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final between the Bruins and Edmonton Oilers goes to triple overtime. Finally, near the end of the third extra period, the Oilers score to end it, but at 115 minutes, this is the longest game in Final history and among the longest games in Boston Bruins history too.

Check out the video here:

The G-form X-Protect for iPhone comes in seven colors and retail for $40. That’s all well and good if you’re an iPhone owner looking for a sturdy case, I suppose. But there’s another distinction here for Boston Bruins fans: Tim Thomas stops every single one of those phones. So, he has a perfect 1.000 save percentage–against iPhones.

This isn’t Thomas’ only foray into the world of advertising, though. Here’s a spot he did earlier this year for Arbella Insurance–a home and car insurance company in New England–in which he is a polite bus rider saving seats for use by his fellow passengers:

Then of course there’s the famous “Peggy” commercial for Discover, featuring a credit card issue happening at a very inopportune time, the famously unhelpful “Peggy” from USA Prime Credit and a taxi driver who is mildly reminiscent of Kathy Bates in Misery. (In real life, she’s Alicia Love, a comedian and DJ for a Boston radio station.) This ad is still in heavy rotation during Stanley Cup playoff games.

1977: The Montreal Canadiens defeat the Bruins 2-1 in overtime of Game 4 of the Final, sweeping their archrivals and hoisting the Cup.

1988: Craig Janney has a two-goal night and the Bruins beat the New Jersey Devils 6-2 in Game 6 of the conference final. For the first time in a decade, the Bruins are headed to the Stanley Cup Final.

1999: The Bruins suffer a 3-0 shutout at the hands of the Buffalo Sabres in Game 4 of the conference semifinal.

2009: The Carolina Hurricanes beat the Bruins 3-2 in overtime after nearly an entire overtime period played. Once again, this overtime defeat ends the Bruins’ playoff run, though unlike in 1977, it’s not to the Stanley Cup champions.

2010: A not-so-great event in Boston Bruins history–they become the third team in the history of the entire NHL to lose a playoff series in which they’d built up a three-nothing lead. Worse yet, they earn this distinction in a 4-3 loss to the Flyers, a game that began with the Bruins having a 3-0 lead in scoring.

2011: The Bruins lose 5-2 to the Tampa Bay Lightning in Game 1 of the conference final. Tyler Seguin, coming into the lineup as a sub for concussed Patrice Bergeron, scores his first goal of the playoffs. Johnny Boychuk adds a goal, but the Lightning were just too strong.

Slovakia defeated Switzerland in a very tightly-won 1-0 victory, eliminating Switzerland from the chance of quarterfinals and bringing Slovakia closer to that next round. Tomas Tatar–who is with the Grand Rapid Griffins, the AHL affiliate of the Detroit Red Wings–scored the lone goal and Jan Laco earned the shutout. Chara played about 21 minutes, which was second overall this time, and got a shot on goal too. Slovakia is in fourth place in Group H, tied with Finland at 12 points. They do need to be mindful of fifth-place France: if they manage a win against Belarus on the 14th and then beat Slovakia on the 15th, they’ll wiggle into fourth place.

The Czech Republic, though, was the team being shut out: Russia beat them 2-0. After an Alexander Perezhogin goal put Russia on the board with less than half a minute gone in the game, the Czechs did keep it scoreless throughout the entire second period, but then Evgeni Malkin (coming off a hat trick against Sweden) struck to add a goal and provide all they needed for the victory. Krejci took fewer faceoffs this time and won just 45 percent of them, plus he didn’t manage any shots on goal. With this defeat, though, Czech is in third in Group S, four points behind second-place Sweden.

Here’s an interesting pattern: four games were played today. Three of them ended in shutouts–America shut out Finland 5-0. But Norway and Germany broke this pattern by ending in a 12-4 Norwegian win. Yes, 12 to four.

Both teams will play their last preliminary round games on May 15: Slovakia faces France, Czech Republic takes on Germany. Then there is a day between games as teams based in Stockholm make the trip to Helsinki, host of all further games.

1978: Like the year before, the Bruins meet the Montreal Canadiens in the Stanley Cup Final. In Game 1, they lose 4-1.

Since not much else of note happened on May 13 in Boston Bruins history, let’s flash back a year to the eve of the Eastern Conference Final series against the Tampa Bay Lightning. Many people in the know had low expectations for the Lightning–some were surprised that they made the playoffs at all–but then they took down the Pittsburgh Penguins in seven games and the Washington Capitals in a four-game sweep (much like the Bruins sweeping the Philadelphia Flyers), storming (pardon the pun) into the competition for the Prince of Wales Trophy.

Here are some pre-series interviews with Bruins personalities ahead of the conference final. Topics include the challenges the Lightning could present, the time between series and the team’s moods as they prepare for the next step.

Slovakia had a day off after beating Kazakhstan, and uniting a disparate band of players who normally earn their living playing on various different teams can be a challenge at any level, so what’s a national team to do? Team fun day at the go-kart track (site is in Slovak)! That is, for everyone except Chara, who is apparently too tall to ride the go-karts. Instead, he sat on the sidelines, still wearing a jumpsuit like his fellow countrymen. But it looks like the team fun day helped because Slovakia followed it up by defeating Belarus 5-1.

The Belorussian team had been rattled by their 5-3 loss to America on May 10: two goals in the first chased goalie Andrei Mezin from the net–and from the tournament. After that game, it was announced that he was leaving Helsinki because he wasn’t happy being the backup. The arrival of the Kostitsyn brothers from the Nashville Predators was supposed to really recharge the team and provide more offense, but it didn’t, at least not in this game. The Kostitsyns did each put up an assist, though.

But Slovakia got the goal-scoring started and then a sudden deluge of offense in the second period resulted in four goals in under four minutes, or about a goal a minute. Belarus was done for. Chara’s contributions included a shot on goal and a team-leading 24 minutes on ice, plus the satisfaction of turning around a team record that began with two losses and didn’t look so great at first.

A day earlier, the Czech Republic took out Italy 6-0. Krejci assisted on the first goal of the game, a tally by Petr Nedved that went to video review but was deemed a good goal. He also won 70 percent of his faceoffs, though he’s taking fewer draws than guys like Jiri Novotny and Tomas Plekanec. Another Nashville Predator made his debut in this game, Martin Erat, and he scored plus he got an assist. Petr Caslava got two goals as well. Even though Czech got the shutout, Plekanec said that his team can still give more. But with a third place berth in Group S, sitting behind two teams that were both undefeated until they faced one another (Russia won the battle of the undefeated teams versus Sweden), it seems like they’re doing alright.

Other games of note on May 12: Canada absolutely demolished Kazakhstan 8-0 and qualifies for the quarterfinals as first place holders in Group S. Norway also earned a shutout, 3-0 against Latvia, and Sweden shut Italy out 4-0.

After a scoreless first period that had seven stopped shots by both goalies, the Knights’ Austin Watson broke through and got on the board. That 1-0 score held until the third period, when Seth Griffith added another goal for London. Though Tom Kuhnhackl broke the shutout and got Niagara on the boards, it wasn’t enough to turn the tides and London won the series in five games.

The Knights last won the Robertson Cup in 2005. At that time, Corey Perry of the Anaheim Ducks was on the team and won the Wayne Gretzky 99 Trophy for playoff MVP. Watson won the 2012 award.

Though Dougie Hamilton was on the losing side of this championship, he’s still earned some recognition: he’s been named to the OHL’s First All-Star Team with 93 voting points, the most among any player.

For the Knights, the quest to raise another trophy will continue in Shawinigan, Quebec, starting on May 19. They will face the Sea Dogs, who just swept the Rimouski Oceanic (including an 8-0 win in Game 4) and earned the QMJHL’s President Cup for the second year in a row. The Sea Dogs are also the defending Memorial Cup champions, so this series could get pretty interesting.

1959: Dave Christian (full name David William Christian) is born in Warroad, Minnesota. Christian comes from a family of Olympian hockey players: his dad and uncle were both on the 1960 gold medal team, while another uncle won silver in 1956. Christian carried the torch by being part of the 1980 gold medal team, touching off his pro career. In addition to representing America in other international tournaments, he joined the Winnipeg Jets one week after winning the gold medal since they’d drafted him a year before. In his very first game, he scored seven seconds into his first shift, which is still a record. In 1983 he went to the Washington Capitals, where he stayed for much of the 80s, though he came to Boston in 1989. He spent two seasons as a Bruin and scored 82 points before moving on to the St. Louis Blues and Chicago Blackhawks, retiring in 1996.

1974: In Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Final, the Bruins are downed 4-1 by the Philadelphia Flyers.

1977: Another Final Game 3 defeat for the Bruins, this time at the hands of the Montreal Canadiens by a score of 4-2.

1988: The New Jersey Devils beat the Bruins 6-3 in Game 6 of their semifinal series. So, for the Bruins this semifinal series so far has been W-L-W-L-W-L.

1995: The Bruins are shut out 1-0 by the Devils in Game 4 of the conference quarterfinals. The game is tied at 0 going into overtime and then the Devils put one home at almost nine minutes into the extra period. Once again, Martin Brodeur gets the shutout.

1999: The Buffalo Sabres beat the Bruins 3-2 in Game 3 of the conference semifinals.

2009: The Bruins defeat the Carolina Hurricanes 4-2 in Game 6 of the conference semifinals, forcing a decisive Game 7 after winning Game 1, dropping the next three and shutting out the Hurricanes in Game 5.

2010: Tuukka Rask faces down Philadelphia’s Ville Leino for the fifth playoff penalty shot against in Boston Bruins history. He stops Leino, but the Flyers win 2-1 in Game 5 of the conference semifinals.

2011: As the Bruins prepare to face the Tampa Bay Lightning, they take a day of practice.