Whatever positive vibes the Boston Bruins may have been feeling after Saturday’s 4-3 overtime win against the rival Toronto Maple Leafs are now a distant memory. Their follow-up performance Tuesday night at TD Garden felt like nothing short of rock bottom.
Facing a Philadelphia Flyers team that was in last place in the Eastern Conference coming in and had given up the most goals in the NHL, the Bruins got shut out, 2-0. What should have been a golden opportunity to build off Saturday was instead a disaster that had the home team getting booed off the ice at the end of the night.
It’s hard to know where to begin with this one, or where the Bruins turn next as they once again find themselves searching for answers on offense.
The power play is as good a place as any to start. It was dreadful Tuesday night, going 0-for-4 with just two shots on goal – and one of those shots was partially blocked and wound up tumbling harmlessly into the waiting glove of Flyers goalie Samuel Ersson.
An extended 5-on-3 early in the first period set the tone for the game. The Bruins’ “top” power-play unit of Charlie McAvoy, David Pastrnak, Elias Lindholm, Brad Marchand and Pavel Zacha was way too stationary, almost refusing to move off their spots as they passed the puck around and failed to open up clean shooting lanes.
The Bruins attempted six shots during the 1:37 that they had a two-man advantage, but really only tested Ersson with one of them. In order, those attempts went: Zacha wide after a partial block, Marchand blocked, Pastrnak saved on a quality look from the left dot (the one actual high-danger chance), Marchand partially blocked and the puck flutters in on goal (technically a shot on goal, but not a dangerous one), McAvoy fouls off a one-timer, McAvoy shoots into a body as the power play expires and hands the Flyers a 2-on-1 the other way.
Credit to the Flyers’ penalty kill, sure, but it just shouldn’t be that hard to open up shooting lanes during a 5-on-3. The Bruins did nothing to get the three killers moving, making the Flyers’ job much easier than it should have been.
That trend continued on the Bruins’ next two 5-on-4 power plays as well, with Boston landing zero shots on goal on both. The Bruins’ man advantage now ranks 26th in the NHL at 14.3%. In the last five games, it is 2-for-20 (10%). It’s bad enough to not convert on a standard two-minute power play, but in the last two games, the Bruins have also squandered an extended 5-on-3 and a four-minute double minor.
Bruins coach Jim Montgomery made one personnel change on his top unit in the third period Tuesday, swapping out Zacha for Justin Brazeau at the net-front. It’s fair to wonder if more changes should or will be coming. Too many plays are dying on the sticks of McAvoy and Marchand, in particular.
“Quicker puck movement,” Montgomery said when asked what the power play needed to do to get more pucks on net. “If you move the puck quick enough and you’re thinking shot first, they’re not gonna be in shot lanes. They’re one less player. Especially 5-on-3, they’re two less players.”
The offense wasn’t much better at 5-on-5. The Bruins at least generated some chances at 5-on-5 in the first two periods, but then they went completely silent in the third. Trailing 1-0, in a situation where they should have been desperate, they generated just three shots on goal all period – one at 5-on-5, one while shorthanded, and one during the 6-on-5 extra attacker situation at the end.
“It’s not good enough,” Montgomery said. “We’re not making plays. We’re not doing enough to generate high-danger scoring chances, whether that’s a will to go to those areas or not the right game plan. We’re all culpable for not coming out with a victory tonight.”
It’s fair to question everything right now. Any lack of will is on the players, and something only they can fix. Not having the right game plan would be on Montgomery and his staff, and could make for some uncomfortable questions about Montgomery’s job security if that’s the case. Montgomery didn’t say it, but it would also be fair to add “personnel that isn’t good enough” as another possibility. That would fall on general manager Don Sweeney, who continues to neither sign veteran Tyler Johnson nor call up a prospect like Fabian Lysell to try to shake things up.
Maybe it is still too early in the season to panic, but the level of concern has to be going up. At 4-5-1, the Bruins are now tied for 11th in the Eastern Conference. They are technically last in the Atlantic Division thanks to the regulation wins tiebreaker (they only have two regulation wins through 10 games). They are tied for 25th in the NHL in scoring. And they followed up arguably their most encouraging game of the season with arguably their most discouraging, a 180 that Montgomery struggled to explain.
“It’s a good question,” Montgomery said when asked why they couldn’t build off that win over Toronto. “It’s a multitude of things, it seems like. Some guys are still fighting it as far as their confidence and their ability to just be smooth with the puck on the ice.”
The Bruins couldn’t take advantage of what had been the worst defensive team in the NHL. Now they will have to try to figure things out against one of the best defensive teams, the Carolina Hurricanes, on Thursday.