Boston sports fans are not known for their patience. When the subject requiring their patience is Tuukka Rask -- already a lightning rod for so many -- things can get uncomfortable quickly.
That’s what Monday night was: Uncomfortable. Rask gave up five goals for the second time in four games since returning from offseason hip surgery as the Bruins lost to the Anaheim Ducks, 5-3. He has an ugly .844 save percentage so far.
Not all five goals were his fault. The Bruins got off to another slow start and the defense in front of him struggled. But one was “terrible” by Rask’s own admission -- a weak shorthanded attempt from Isac Lundestrom that trickled through his legs -- and a couple others may have been stoppable if he had been able to track the puck better.
The most impatient and most vocal among the fans at TD Garden started a “We want Swayman” chant in the third period, referencing the highly touted rookie they never wanted to see sent down to Providence in the first place. It didn’t really catch on. It wasn’t exactly deafening. But it was loud enough to hear, and it was quite the shift from that “We want Tuukka” chant we heard less than two weeks ago when Rask was backing up Linus Ullmark in his first official game back.
The Bruins have been preaching patience. They expected Rask to have some rust following surgery and so much time off. Coach Bruce Cassidy made it clear it would take more than a handful of games before they could draw any conclusions. While acknowledging that Rask wasn’t good enough Monday, Cassidy stressed that same message again.
“Well, he’s not where he needs to be,” Cassidy said. “I think that’s evident. We weren’t sure he would be this soon, either. As I said, I think you need seven or eight starts, probably. … Certainly needed a few more saves if we were going to win tonight. But again, he’ll need more starts, and then we’ll have to evaluate it. Right now, not where he needs to be.”
Rask identified several areas of his game he knows he needs to improve.
“I think it’s more my depth at times. Looking briefly at some of those goals, I’m too deep in the crease, giving too much net away,” Rask said. “And then tracking the puck, obviously it’s not as sharp as it should be. Puck play also. A lot of things, but it’s gonna come. I have to work on it. I’ve made some saves at times that show that it’s still there, but it’s the consistency within the games. You can’t let in one or two bad goals a game, because you’re doing the total opposite of what you’re supposed to do at that point.”
He admitted it has been challenging to get all of that up to speed in the middle of the season, but also said he expects better of himself and is “not satisfied” with how things have gone so far.
“We’re midway through the season. We don’t have the luxury of throwing games away, putting me in there, and letting me figure it out,” Rask said. “I need to be sharp every time I go out there, and that’s my job to find it, I guess. It’s not easy, but I just have to work on it and game in, game out find that consistency and try to help the team get some wins.”
The thing is, the Bruins actually do kind of have that luxury. They are firmly in the playoffs right now, eight points ahead of ninth-place Detroit with three games still in hand. That at least makes it a little easier to let Rask work through his issues at the NHL level.
There is a case to be made that Rask should have worked through some of this in the AHL. The original plan was for him make one or two starts in Providence. The P-Bruins had two games postponed, though, and Rask and the Bruins believed he was ready to start in Boston rather than wait another week.
While there have already been calls on social media to send Rask down again for the time being, that ship has sailed. Rask is on a one-way NHL contract now and isn’t going anywhere.
The reality is that the only path to getting right is to continue to play in NHL games. With such a compact schedule, there aren’t enough competitive practices to even come close to simulating game action there.
Ullmark was already scheduled to start Wednesday in Colorado. Rask will make his next start either Friday in Arizona or Sunday in Dallas. He and the Bruins will hope it looks better than Monday did.
If it doesn’t, they still won’t be ready to panic, but you can bet the patience from some fans will wear a little thinner.