Hours before Tuesday’s game against the Canadiens was set to begin, Bruins forward Brad Marchand apparently wanted to get the first shot in.

Marchand, who has never been afraid to put things frankly, shared some interesting thoughts on the Habs Tuesday morning.

“They like to get in and shoot their mouths off and then when you hit them they’ll dive down and fall easy,” Marchand told a group that included CTV’s Arpon Basu.

“They get a lot of shots behind the play, and then they play it off like when we run them they didn’t do anything to deserve it.”

The rivalry has provided no shortage of fireworks this season, as the two teams combined for 187 minutes on Feb. 9, with many of those minutes coming from a scrap caused by a late Marchand hit on James Wisniewski after the whistle upon the Habs’ defenseman touching up on an icing call.

Marchand was also the recipient of a huge hit from P.K. Subban on Dec. 16 that caused him to miss a few games with what the team described as “soreness.”