Bruins Notes: Jim Montgomery Points To Game Management As Reason For Loss

BOSTON — The Bruins had their four-game winning streak snapped by the Pittsburgh Penguins with a flourish of back-and-forth goals at TD Garden on Thursday night.

Boston was able to get on the board first when Brad Marchand potted his 14th goal of the season just 41 seconds in, but the Bruins weren’t able to contain the Penguins, who scored four goals in the opening frame and six total in the Pittsburgh’s win.

Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery said he thought about pulling goalie Jeremy Swayman at one point during the contest.

“I knew it was gonna be one of the back-and-forth games. We did think about, probably in the second is when we thought about making a goalie change,” Montgomery explained. “Once before I’ve made a switch and I wanted to see our goalie fight through it. Sometimes you give them the opportunity to fight through it. When it’s a game where it’s back-and-forth like that, I thought that was the opportunity to do it.”

Even though the Bruins battled back in the third period to tie the game at 5-5, the Penguins were able to capitalize on a power play in the final frame to secure the win. Montgomery said he wasn’t pleased with the team’s game management throughout the matchup.

“I don’t like our ice management. I don’t like the odd man rushes we gave up. Whether it’s on the power play or five-on-five,” Montgomery said. “Giving up an odd-man rush … it cost us the penalty that ended up getting them the sixth goal.

“We’re just not making sound decisions. We’re forcing stuff when we don’t need to. We’re getting plenty of offense. We didn’t have to force offense and unfortunately, our game management, I think, cost us the game.”

The Bruins trailed the Penguins 4-2 at the end of the first period and 5-4 at the end of the second before Marchand scored his first shorthanded goal in nearly two years — the last coming on Jan. 12, 2022. Montgomery acknowledged Boston’s fight throughout the game.

“You have to love, as a coach you have to love the way your team never stops fighting,” Montgomery said. “We never stopped fighting. We believed the entire game, even when it was 5-2, that we’re going to come back, and when we did, we came back to tie it up at five. You want to have that kind of spirit in your team.”

Montgomery praised Marchand for his ability to protect the puck the way he did on the shorthanded goal.

THE SHORTY KING GETS SILKY 👑 pic.twitter.com/tf05dsCoG3

— Boston Bruins (@NHLBruins) January 5, 2024

“Unbelievable,” Montgomery said. “First of all, to protect the puck like he did so the defenseman couldn’t chip it out, very underrated play. Then he gets the puck, and he puts it through him. Then just his bulldog strength, how he gets under a guy, frees himself up, gets his hands loose. It really energized the bench because it’s one of those second and third-effort plays where he inspires his teammates.”

Here are more notes from Thursday night’s Bruins-Penguins game:

— The six goals that Jeremy Swayman gave up in the game were more than the five goals he gave up across four games he started in the month of October.

— Jake DeBrusk and Charlie Coyle each extended their point streaks to five games. DeBrusk added a goal in the second period, and Coyle had the assist on Marchand’s shorthanded goal.

— Marchand, Morgan Geekie and David Pastrnak all had multi-point games for the Bruins. Marchand had two goals in the game, while Geekie and Pastrnak both had a goal and two assists each.

— The Bruins wrap up their two-game homestand before they head out on a four-game road trip when they host the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday. Puck drop from TD Garden is scheduled for 7 p.m. ET, and you can catch the game, plus an hour of pregame coverage, on NESN.