The Bruins have given up a game-tying or game-winning goal in the final minute of regulation in three of their last four games. They lost to the Anaheim Ducks with 22 seconds remaining last Tuesday, blew a lead with three seconds left against the Columbus Blue Jackets on Saturday, and, most recently, surrendered a tying goal with 26 seconds to go Monday night before losing to the Los Angeles Kings in overtime.
Obviously, that is not ideal. While the Bruins are still safely in the playoffs, dropping points late in games is not something you want to make a habit of.
So, there are a couple questions worth asking: 1) Why is this happening? 2) Just how concerning is it?
As Bruce Cassidy pointed out after the game, Monday night was different than the Anaheim and Columbus games. In both of those games, the Bruins took a penalty in the final minute that gave their opponent a late power play -- a 6-on-4 power play in the Blue Jackets’ case since they also had the goalie pulled.
Against the Ducks, a turnover by Craig Smith led to more time pinned in the defensive zone, and that eventually led to a potentially tired Charlie McAvoy taking a hooking penalty in front of the net. Against Columbus, it was Nick Foligno taking another hooking penalty at the end of a long shift. In both cases, the Bruins paid the price for losing faceoffs, not being able to get out of their zone, relieve pressure, and get a much-needed line change.
Cassidy thought his team actually did a better job in that regard on Monday, but got victimized by bad luck as much as anything.
“They were on the outside,” Cassidy said. “They had an off-net shot -- had to be three feet wide -- and we knocked it down right to them. So that’s a little bit of tough luck on that particular play. The other ones were self-inflicted. This one I thought we kept them to the outside. It wasn’t a bunch of shots. Unfortunately, once we knocked the puck down, we lost position on [Trevor] Moore in front and it’s an easy tap-in.”
He’s right. The Bruins held the Kings to nine shots on goal, 18 shot attempts and just two high-danger chances in the third, so it’s not like they had been getting bombarded. Arthur Kaliyev was the King who had the one-timer attempt that, to Cassidy’s point, was clearly going wide. But instead of harmlessly sailing into the corner, it hit McAvoy -- who was battling with Moore -- at the side of the net and dropped right onto Moore’s stick.
Ironically, McAvoy missed a block that could have prevented Jakub Voracek’s tying goal on Saturday, so he just can’t seem to catch a break during this stretch. To the question about how concerning all this is… worrying too much about McAvoy doesn’t seem necessary. He’s one of the best defensemen -- focus on defense -- in the NHL. Chances are he’ll be just fine in these situations going forward.
The bigger problem on Monday was the turnover Charlie Coyle committed on the overtime winner, when he blindly whipped a pass to the middle of the ice that Andreas Athanasiou picked off and took the other way for a breakaway goal.
“As for overtime, you have to value the puck,” Cassidy said. “The play at the end, it’s just not a very good hockey play, let’s face it. Gave up a breakaway. We got what we deserved on that play.”
That ruined an otherwise great night for Coyle, who had the primary assist on both Boston goals with nice setups to Trent Frederic and Smith. Coyle’s overtime turnover on Monday and Smith’s late turnover against Anaheim are two of the few blemishes for that third line recently, but they’re obviously very noticeable blemishes.
Like with McAvoy, though, is it really a reason to freak out? It has to be cleaned up, obviously, but puck protection is one of that line’s strengths. Smith and Coyle are usually pretty smart decision-makers. You would still expect them to do the right thing in late-game situations going forward.
“There’s only two things you can do,” Smith said. “You sit and be pissed about it, which we are right now, but we have to make the next step forward and make the corrections and make sure that we’re tightening up. It’s all things that we can fix, and we have the people to do it.”
The Bruins have given up the sixth-fewest third-period goals this season. They’re still 23-1-3 when leading after two periods and 7-3-0 when tied after two. They’re the fifth-best faceoff team in the NHL, so these lost draws in their own zone aren’t part of some bigger, season-long trend either. What’s happened recently can’t be ignored, but it probably doesn’t warrant a full-blown panic either.
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