For much of January, it was nothing but positivity around the Bruins. How could it not be? They came out of the holiday COVID pause on fire, winning 10 of their first 12 games and playing like one of the best teams in the league. Two wins over the Capitals and a convincing win over the Lightning served as evidence that it wasn't all a fluke.
The past week hasn't completely undone all that, but it sure has left a sour taste in the mouth and turned a good chunk of that positivity into concern.
The week started with a 5-3 loss to the Ducks at TD Garden. Tuukka Rask struggled mightily, but so did the team in front of him. The Bruins then went on the road and appeared to be on their way to a signature win over the league-leading Avalanche, only to blow a two-goal, third-period lead and have it all come crumbling down in an overtime loss.
A date with the lowly Coyotes on Friday night should have been the perfect opportunity for a get-right game. The Bruins got the win, but they didn't look particularly good doing it. They certainly didn't dominate and in fact needed several big saves from Linus Ullmark in the closing minutes to preserve the 2-1 victory.
Then came Sunday night in Dallas. A good effort and a win would have made it a successful road trip and would have still ended the month on a positive note. Instead, the Bruins laid an egg. For the second time in two weeks (the other being a 7-1 loss to the Hurricanes), the Bruins basically no-showed, failing to make the game even remotely competitive en route to a 6-1 loss.
Some of the same problems that plagued them during their inconsistent first few months have resurfaced, with poor decisions with the puck at the top of the list. On Wednesday in Denver, an inability to clear the zone or maintain any sort of possession doomed them as the Avalanche mounted their comeback.
On Sunday, the mistakes came all over the ice. Just take a look at the Stars' two first-period goals that put the Bruins in an early hole. On the first, Charlie McAvoy carelessly flung a shot right into a Dallas defender, leading to a quick transition the other way that ended with Tyler Seguin's first of two goals.
On the second, three mistakes combined to give Alexander Radulov a breakaway goal. Oskar Steen passed up an easy pass to a pinching Mike Reilly and instead dumped the puck into a high-traffic area behind the net, which turned the Bruins' possession into a 50/50 battle and also left Reilly stranded up ice.
Steven Fogarty then lost that 50/50 battle behind the net, giving the Stars a chance to break out. Fortunately for the Bruins, the Stars turned the puck over on said breakout. Unfortunately, Derek Forbort then turned it right back over, the final gaffe before the breakaway. Forbort was also at fault on the fourth goal, when he meekly lost a battle along the boards to Denis Gurianov and then lost track of Jamie Benn in the slot.
"We have to be harder back there," Bruce Cassidy said of his defense. "It starts on your back end, winning your battles, getting the puck out of your zone. … You have to execute at an NHL level, especially against good teams that are really pushing it. We didn't do enough of that tonight."
Cassidy didn't like what his forwards were doing either.
"On the offensive side of it, the forward group, we didn't do it either, getting pucks behind them early to establish the forecheck," he said. "I thought we were stubborn in that way. So you put those two things together against a good hockey club that defends well, it was gonna be an uphill battle. We didn't figure it out."
With Erik Haula landing on the COVID list earlier Sunday, Cassidy had to juggle his lines. Nothing seemed to click. He reunited David Pastrnak with Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand, but they didn't exactly rediscover their old form. They got consistently outplayed by Dallas' top line of Jason Robertson, Roope Hintz and Joe Pavelski and didn't register a single high-danger chance between them.
Cassidy also put Taylor Hall, Charlie Coyle and Craig Smith back together as his second line; they looked like the same second line that struggled to find chemistry earlier this season. Smith did score his first goal in seven games, but that came in the third period after another lineup shuffle that put him and Coyle with Jake DeBrusk instead of Hall.
Another midgame change came in goal, as Cassidy pulled Ullmark after four goals and put in Jeremy Swayman for his first NHL action since Jan. 6. Cassidy said that was more about the team's play in front of Ullmark than his play, though.
Cassidy was asked if fatigue was a factor Sunday, and he acknowledged it "plays some role in it." While it's true the Bruins have had a busy schedule this month, here's the thing: It's going to be this busy the rest of the season.
The Bruins have one more game before the All-Star break (Tuesday at home against Seattle), and then they have a week off. After that, they don't have more than two days off for the rest of the regular season. They'll finish the season with 39 games in 81 days, basically the same every-other-day pace they had in January.
If one month playing at that pace has led to some fatigue, what are three months of this going to do? And if the Bruins needed to be fresh to play as well as they were playing earlier this month, well, they'll probably have another week or two of being fresh after the All-Star break and then that's it.
Perhaps this was just a tough week for the Bruins and not indicative of bigger problems. Those happen over the course of a season. Perhaps they'll get back to being the team they were for the first three weeks of January. But this wasn't a good way to end the month, and some issues the Bruins hoped they had buried are suddenly back.
