Welcome to a new kind of scoreboard watching. The Boston Bruins keep losing, and suddenly some of the other teams tracking towards a top-10 pick have started winning.
So, instead of looking at how close the Bruins are to a playoff spot (spoiler: not close enough), we’re now looking at how close they are to a top-five pick. After Saturday, they’re getting pretty close.
The Bruins lost again, falling 2-1 to the Detroit Red Wings to cap off an 0-5-0 road trip. Casey Mittelstadt nearly tied the game with under 10 seconds to go, but Cam Talbot jabbed out his glove and just about blindly snagged it.
The Bruins have now lost eight in a row, with an 0-7-1 record dating back to March 13. It’s tied for the third-longest losing streak in franchise history, with only an 11-gamer in 1924-25 and a 10-gamer in 2009-10 ahead of it.
The Bruins landed just 21 shots on goal Saturday, including going 14 minutes without one to start the third period. They have now had 25 shots or fewer in 10 straight games, extending the franchise record. Since the NHL began officially recording shots in 1959-60, only 10 other teams have had such a streak. The last was Edmonton in 2006-07.
And so, the Bruins are now 30-35-9, giving them 69 points in 74 games for a .466 points percentage. That ties them with the Pittsburgh Penguins for the seventh-worst record in the NHL (pending Seattle's late game Saturday night). They had already fallen behind the Anaheim Ducks this week, due in large part to Wednesday’s head-to-head loss.
The Philadelphia Flyers, now sans John Tortorella, won earlier Saturday and now have 69 points as well, although they have played one more game and therefore technically have a worse record. The Seattle Kraken have 68. That’s who the Bruins are chasing for, potentially, the fifth overall pick, depending on how the draft lottery ping pong balls fall.
Heck, even the Buffalo Sabres have won three of four and could potentially be caught for the fourth-worst record. The Sabres have three fewer points than the Bruins, but with two games in hand. Only the bottom three of San Jose, Chicago and Nashville might truly be out of reach.
Why does this all matter? Well, for one, the lower the Bruins sink in the standings, the higher the odds that they could actually win the lottery and get the first overall pick – although it’s still under 10% unless they finish in the bottom three.
Besides that, though, getting into the top five could be more than just a superficial distinction in this draft. While prospect rankings and draft boards are sure to change a bit between now and June, the tiers at the top of the draft are shaping up something like this:
Tier 1:
LHD Matthew Schaefer (Erie Otters, OHL)
C Michael Misa (Saginaw Spirit, OHL)
Tier 2:
C James Hagens (Boston College, NCAA)
RW Porter Martone (Brampton Steelheads, OHL)
C Anton Frondell (Djurgardens, Allsvenskan)
C Caleb Desnoyers (Moncton Wildcats, QMJHL)
Tier 3:
C Roger McQueen (Brandon Wheat Kings, WHL)
LW Victor Eklund (Djurgardens, Allsvenskan)
RHD Radim Mrtka (Seattle Thunderbirds, WHL)
Tier 4:
C Jake O’Brien (Brantford Bulldogs, OHL)
RW Justin Carbonneau (Blainville-Boisbriand Armada, QMJHL)
LW Carter Bear (Everett Silvertips, WHL)
From a Bruins perspective, naturally your attention immediately goes to the centers. Boston desperately needs to find a No. 1 center of the future, and this draft may very well be their best opportunity to find one. They’re probably not getting Misa unless they jump up to one or two in the lottery.
That next group of Hagens, Frondell and Desnoyers, though? Get a top-five pick and it’s pretty much a guarantee at least one of them will be on the board. Maybe one of them slips to six, seven or eight if the Bruins end up in that range. McQueen or even O’Brien wouldn’t be a bad consolation prize at all, although McQueen has had injury issues that would need to be taken into account.
But the top five would really be a nice place for the Bruins to be, and this eight-game losing streak has absolutely put that possibility on the table.