It wasn't hard to figure out that Linus Ullmark was dealing with some sort of injury. He looked slow moving in his crease at times, and stayed down longer than usual after more than a couple saves. He was a game-time decision before Game 3 and skipped several morning skates.
Picking up the pieces after Bruins' stunning collapse
The severity of the injury, whatever it was, was unknown, but it now appears it was fairly significant. According to ESPN's Kevin Weekes, Ullmark "was playing through a debilitating & painful injury that limited his mobility and technique."
Assuming this is true -- and Weekes is pretty plugged in -- it makes it even more baffling that Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery and goalie coach Bob Essensa chose to ride Ullmark for six straight games to start the series.
Ullmark clearly looked like a goalie who was wearing down as the series went on, giving up 10 goals in Games 5 and 6. The Bruins finally turned to Jeremy Swayman in Game 7, a tough situation for a goalie to be making his first start of the series.
The Bruins got historically great goaltending from Ullmark and Swayman in the regular season, and they got it by sticking to a pretty strict rotation for the entire second half of the season. Swayman's numbers during that time were every bit as good as Ullmark's.
There was certainly an argument to be made for continuing the rotation into the playoffs, even if such a move would have bucked convention. At the very least, it's fair to question why Montgomery and Essensa were unwilling to turn to Swayman earlier in the series, knowing how limited Ullmark was.
Maybe Swayman was also dealing with something that we don't yet know about, but as it stands now, it looks like the Bruins stuck with an injured goalie for too long for the second time in the last three years, having gone down with Tuukka Rask and his injured hip in 2021 against the Islanders rather than turn to a then-rookie Swayman.
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