Bruins @ Sens RECAP: Boston’s defense falls apart late in 6-5 SO LOSS

Given the two roads ahead of Boston, this was not the kind of game you wanted to give up if you wanted them to reinforce themselves.

…Are you f!#king kidding me, B’s?

First Period

The Bruins didn’t start great.

They didn’t start great at all. 2-0 Senators.

However, they did get a power play, and Pavel Zacha took a beautiful pass straight past Ottawa’s rookie goalie. 2-1 Senators.

Then, David Pastrnak took a look at that and decided it looked fun, so he joined in late in the period on a transition chance that rocketed right past Merilainen and into the net! 2-2 Everybody!

Helluva bounce back given how it started!

2nd Period

Morgan Geekie saw Zacha and Pastrnak score, and he thought that looked pretty cool. He wondered if he could score like they could.

So Morgan and David went ahead and made that dream real on an absolutely unreal passing play. 3-2 Bruins!

Unfortunately, The Bruins PK coughed up a goal to Josh Norris off a tip-in. 3-3 Everybody again.

Mercifully, later in the period, Johnny Beecher took a long shot, and that shot somehow made it’s way to the back of the net! 4-3 Bruins!

Onto the third!

3rd Period

Vinni Lettieri made fans of him all over the North End, as about halfway and change through the period he crashed the net after a power play, and managed to put the puck through! 5-3 Bruins!

And from here, most teams would probably collect two points, make backchecking an emphasis at practice, and move on to playing an otherwise mediocre San Jose.

The Boston Bruins defense on the other hand, had other plans. Horrible, awful plans. The Senators spent almost the entire final 4 minutes of regulation without a goaltender in net, and Boston, for all their “effort”, couldn’t find a way to get the puck into the empty net, nor clear their zone.

The results were disastrous, and predictable.

We go to Overtime and the shootout with the score tied 5-5.

Overtime and the Shootout.

Nothing happened in OT and that gave Leevi Merilainen a chance to truly steal the game.

He didn’t miss that chance.

Bruins lose 6-5 in a shootout.

Game Notes

• Your TOI Leader was Nikita Zadorov. That my friend, was a mistake on Joe Sacco’s part.
• While the Bruins made a good effort of trying to take control of this game…they absolutely earned this loss for failing to do so. Far too many failed clears, a miserable start that saw Boston down 2-0 after less than 10 minutes of game time, spent almost the entire length of the game getting absolutely pounded into the dust on shot attempts…this was earmarked for, at the very least, a shocking steal or an absolutely crushing loss, and that it ended in a shootout and a single point is nothing short of a miracle.
• Well, if you were wondering how bad it could be if McAvoy and Lindholm were out for any stretch of time, you got your answer, and it was underlined and written in bile. It has been a long time, maybe since the 2015-16 season, since I’ve seen the Black and Gold’s backcheck be this disinterested in helping their goaltender, if not actively making it worse. Every single person who played with Brandon Carlo tonight became as unplayable as he did. The skating was never there. The stick-work was never there. The decision-making was actively awful. Nobody knew what to do with their bodies. Just an absolutely painful effort to sit through.
• If you were someone who was skeptical of Nikita Zadorov or Elias Lindholm to begin the season, this was the kind of effort you saw in your nightmares. Those two were uniquely awful tonight. Completely disengaged from what was going on around them, contributed almost nothing to the score, and effectively spent their times making life harder for themselves. Gonna need way, way, WAY more from both of them.
• It appears Charlie Coyle has inherited Jake DeBrusk’s penchant for goal-less streaks of maddening inconsistency, as he’s got 2 points over his last ten games and it is rapidly becoming over a month since he’s scored a single goal. Not great!
• Swayman saw 44 shots on goal and finished with an .886 SV%. This was better than Merilainen’s SV% at the end of the game, but in a game like this, it stops being about the goaltender and starts being more about the goalscorers. Still, we’re probably gonna hear about this until next game. To which my answer is this: Did you see how the team in front of him was playing?
• David Pastrnak had three points tonight for the third straight game, bringing him up to his 4th season of 50+ points. If this keeps up, he’s gonna be a 70+ point player out of the playoffs because most of his teammates refuse to budge from around 25 or so.
• For whatever reason, Joe Sacco made the decision to bench Brad Marchand in overtime. Frankly, given how exactly three players plus Johnny Beecher decided they wanted to be part of the game tonight, I can understand the logic. I don’t agree with it, but I can understand it.
• Cam Neely made mention of two paths going ahead towards the NHL Trade Deadline, and if retooling is one of the paths coming into it, I think the Bruins are making a pretty heavy case for a retool. There’s still plenty of time for them to find space in the playoffs, and they get to play the San Jose Sharks next, but I think we’ve seen more than enough from this team; analytically and from the eye test, to know that if they do make it, it will be in spite of their talent and effort; not because of it.

---

The Bruins get a chance to get back into the swing of things by playing the San Jose Sharks on Monday night. That game begins at 7pm EST.

We’ll see you there. Be chill, everybody.