TAMPA -- The eye-candy aspect of Bruins rookie Tyler Seguin's game is obvious. He has speed through the neutral zone, an unmistakable gift when it comes to splitting defenseman and a harder shot than you'd think. He's fancy and he can score highlight-reel goals. 

The Eastern Conference finals has been a coming out party for Seguin, but it isn’t the ability to score that has emerged out of thin air. That’s been there all along. Now, the ability to play in the NHL is creeping out of the Ontario native, and the little things that he never seemed to do are suddenly there. 

Look at Andrew Ference's goal in the third period of Thursday's 2-0 Bruins' win in Game 2. One should be inclined to give Seguin very little credit given that he was initially wrongfully credited with the goal, but the shift showed one of the "little things" that Seguin wasn't doing earlier in the season. With the puck along the boards, Seguin held onto it and drew a pair of Lightning players onto him before sending the puck low to Chris Kelly. From there, Kelly sent it behind the net to Michael Ryder, who fed Ference for the tally and the game's final goal. 

It was the kind of play Seguin wouldn’t have made a few months ago, and just the play that would have proven Claude Julien right in limiting his minutes. Now, it’s a play that he makes and nobody gives it a second look.

“That's what you get from playing with the puck more on your stick, and getting more confident and more poised,” Seguin said Friday after the team’s practice at St. Pete Times forum. “I feel like I'm able to make those plays now. Before, I was a little bit more jumpy and now I think I can settle it down and make those types of plays.”

Seguin fanatics who feel better about their No. 19 tattoos with each goal he scores won’t see the four-point periods that often. They won’t always see Seguin making Mike Lundin look foolish, as he did in Game 1, but the things that don’t make the highlight reels will make him every bit as much a difference-maker as the flashy plays. It’s something that he’s beginning to realize, and perhaps something that comes with a goal-scorers' rush from three goals in six periods. 

These are things that certainly weren’t there when Julien cut back on the rookie’s ice time in the regular season. The Ference goal in Game 3 stands out because earlier in the season one could count the times Seguin got rid of the puck way too quickly on one hand, assuming the hand had more than 50 fingers. Words of encouragement from the rookie’s partner in crime may have helped that change.

“It has to do a lot with confidence,” Michael Ryder said. “I told him, 'Just skate and hold onto the puck and make plays. You don't need to throw it away.' I think that he's doing that. I think it has a lot to do with confidence, and he learned a lot this year. It helps when you hard away from the puck. He's been doing all of that and it's paying off for him.”

While the rookie shows signs that he’s getting the hang of a higher level of play, nobody who has followed his career should be surprised. Seguin was the ninth overall pick in the OHL draft back in 2008, but was buried on the depth chart in favor of older, more experienced players. He made minimal impact as a fourth-liner in his first year with the Plymouth Whalers, scoring just one goal in his first 17 games. When Mike Vellucci, the very man who drafted him, took over as head coach during the season, Seguin became a top-six guy, and once he got going he developed into the prospect that made him the top-ranked player in the 2010 draft.

“I guess you can look at it like that,” Seguin said. “It's definitely a different stage, but I think I take time to adapt. Once I do, I try to grab a hold of it and run with it.” 

Of course, Seguin still gives reminders that he's a rookie and that he's still adjusting to the physical aspect of the game. He's sticking his nose into the action more, but a clear-cut case of physical reluctance occurred a little more than five minutes into the third period. With Marc-Andre Bergeron playing a puck in the corner, Seguin seemed hesitant to take the body before Ryder came flying in to crush Bergeron. 

Although nobody will ever mistake Seguin for being a physical player, the effort – that third-period play aside – seems to be there more. You’ll still see instances of the 19-year-old slowing down as he races a player for the puck to avoid being the first man there and receiving the hit, but those moments come far more rarely. It seems clear enough that there’s been an effort made on his part to eliminate what has been his most obvious criticism. 

“When I came in the lineup and was given the opportunity, I didn't want to just put results up, I wanted to do the whole package,” Seguin said Friday, adding that “it's not always about results, especially when you get the win."

Added Ryder: “He's starting to battle more, he's throwing hits and I think he's getting physically involved. That's what we need out of him, and that's how he gets into the game a little more. It's just a different aspect that he's learned this year to put in.”

Whatever Seguin has done to keep himself in all areas of the game, it’s working. The confidence that’s accompanied this scoring has allowed him to start doing the things that he didn’t have to do in the OHL, and therefore didn’t do when he first came to Boston.

“It’s confidence. And he's gotten used to playing our game now. And you’ve got to remember last year, this guy was such an elite player in junior hockey that he just went out there and played,” Julien said. “As a coach, when you have a player like that you let him play. 

“Once he got here, he understood that he can't just go out there and play and just be all over the place. He's really understanding what has to be done at this level and the choices of plays he has to make in certain situations. And did a great job at keeping that puck. And he did the right play obviously putting it behind the net.”

Yet through all that Seguin has started to show the Bruins, there’s one thing in particular that his coach has seen that proved he has a gift unlike any player on the ice.

“I was impressed with that 30-foot stick of his when he tipped that goal in, I guess,” Julien said with a grin, poking fun at the scorer’s decision to initially credit Seguin with Ference’s goal. “That was even more impressive.”