Groundhog Day Yet Again for Freefalling Bruins

Groundhog Day was this past Tuesday, but for the Bruins, this season of frustration has been one long, extended version of Feb. 2.

Every game, it is something new that sets the Bruins back: an injury, a bad call, a costly mistake in their own zone, a hot goalie between the opposing pipes, a missed empty net, a woeful power play, and the list goes on.

After losing another heartbreaker in a 3-2 shootout loss to their hated rivals, the Montreal Canadiens, on Thursday night, the Bruins are two games shy of the franchise's worst losing streak, set in 1924-25, which was the team's inaugural season.

"I don't think, none that I remember, but things happen," Steve Begin said when asked if he could recall a stretch of futility this frustrating. "It's a long season, and it's been tough for us lately but, we have to stop feeling sorry for ourselves."

One thing the Black and Gold deserve credit for is that they are finally creating some offense laely, but the end result is always the same: a loss and a step back further in the tight Eastern Conference playoff race.

The Bruins have 89 shots in the last two games and only three goals and one point to show for it. While Begin couldn't find a comparison for the frustration level in the Bruins' dressing room and the cloud of hard luck that continues to hang over this team, he has been on a team and in a dressing room with a club that finished atop the Eastern Conference regular-season standings and then fell from grace the following season. In fact, he played some of those players Thursday night on his former team.

"I know what it's like to be up so high and have so much hype and then dip in the standings because I went through it last season in Montreal," he said. "I don't know, sometimes for whatever reason this happens to teams, and it's just completely different the next season. You lose your way a bit or start slow, and next thing you know, you're here."

Begin believes this Bruins team is different than the 2008-09 Habs squad that barely squeaked into the Eastern Conference playoffs as an eighth seed before being swept by the Bruins.

"I see more here," he said. "I think we have a lot better team than we have been showing lately, a lot better. I think we have everything that a team needs to win. Now, it's just not working, so we have to stay positive. We have to look ahead and think about tomorrow. What is in the past is in the past. It's over. We have to put a cross on it and just have fun, keep working, and we know it's going to come. 

"We've shown some good things lately, and we have to work on those things and bring those things the next day," Begin added. "Right now, it's tough but we'll get out of it. We'll find a way to win. Then we will laugh at it after."

That would be nice, because right now, there's definitely no laughter in the dressing room, but rather looks of bewilderment and the same question: "How did we get here … again?"