MONTREAL — The Boston Bruins suffered their fourth loss in six games in a 6-4 defeat to the rival Montreal Canadiens on Thursday night at Bell Centre.
The B’s are off to their worst start since 2011-12, when they began their Stanley Cup title defense 3-7-0 before finishing the campaign with 102 points and an Atlantic Division title.
The main issue in Thursday’s loss — and one that has plagued the team in five games — was defensive breakdowns in front of goaltender Tuukka Rask.
“I think we lost our focus, and because of that, we made some real bad mistakes that ended up in the back of our net,” Bruins head coach Claude Julien said. “As a coach, you’re happy with the effort because it was there (Thursday), but disappointed in some of the decisions we made that cost us some goals. We’ve got to fix that.”
Boston has been making uncharacteristic mistakes in its own end, many of which are mental errors. This is part of the reason why the B’s have allowed 2.83 goals per game despite giving up just 23.5 shots per game (third-fewest total in the NHL). The scoring chances that are being allowed are very good ones, and that was the case Thursday.
The Bruins were protecting a 3-2 lead with under two minutes left in the second period when the tide turned in Montreal’s favor. Boston was unable to clear the zone, chased the puck too much, allowed Alexei Emelin’s shot from point to reach Rask, then failed to pick up Jiri Sekac before he pounced on the rebound.
On Montreal’s fourth goal just 1:25 later, David Krejci left the slot to defend Tomas Plekanec along the wall because the Canadiens center was all alone. Krejci’s departure from the slot allowed P.A. Parenteau to have all the time in the world to fire a one-timer past Rask, giving the Canadiens the lead and changing the momentum.
The good news for the Bruins is that these mistakes are fixable. The team will look at film and figure out which adjustments must be made. But it also proves how costly these mistakes can be against a Canadiens team with lots of high-end skill at forward and on the blue line.
“In these games, we don’t give up a lot of shots, but when we do, they’re tough shots and they’re scoring chances,” Rask said. “It’s tough for a goalie to be ready for those, because you’re ready for that shot, but the puck bounces backdoor and stuff like that and we break down. It’s tough for a goalie to get a read on those, but I think a lot of it is just mental and doing our jobs, and not worry about the other guys’ job.”
— A fan directed a laser pointer at Rask a few times, but the B’s goaltender didn’t notice it when the action was in his end of the ice.
“At me?” Rask said. “I think I saw it a little bit in the second period, but it was in the offensive zone. It’s a good thing I didn’t go blind or anything.”
— The Chris Kelly-Carl Soderberg-Loui Eriksson line again was one of Boston’s best trios. Soderberg scored his first goal of the season at 8:34 of the second period, and Eriksson tallied his second less than three minutes later. This line has combined for four goals and seven assists, and Soderberg and Kelly have a team-leading four points (one goal and three assists each).
— Zdeno Chara opened the scoring with a power-play goal in the first period, deflecting a David Krejci shot from the point past Canadiens goalie Carey Price. Boston ranks 20th in the NHL with a 15.8 percent success rate (3-for-19) with the man advantage.
— Boston’s next game is Saturday night in Buffalo against the Sabres.
Photo via Eric Bolte/USA TODAY Sports Images
