OTTAWA — After the Bruins dropped their first home game in regulation to the Colorado Avalanche, coach Bruce Cassidy conceded that he expected a better sense of urgency from his team against one of the best teams in the league. But he pointed out that you can’t just “flip a switch” in this league. The team’s bad habits that were slowly surfacing in their 13-game point streak had come home to roost.
But on Monday night at Canadian Tire Centre, the B’s showed just how much work they have to do to get back to the level of play that catapulted them to the top of the league standings.
It was another sleepy start for the B’s, who fell behind 2-0 in the first period to the Ottawa Senators and could never fully recover, losing a 5-2 decision to the rebuilding but scrappy Sens. The loss snapped a 10-game winning streak against Ottawa. The Sens’ Anders Nilsson (38 saves) was very good, especially in the third, but this was not a case of a goalie stealing the game. The B’s were not good enough.
“We’re going through a tough stretch in terms of getting our energy level where it needs to be,” said coach Bruce Cassidy. “If you’re not competing hard on the puck, around the puck in this league, you’re not going to beat anybody. And Ottawa was just better than us.”
Whether or not this is the wall that everyone was expecting the B’s to hit at some point, they have to be better.
“It’s one of those things where a season is filled with ups and downs and we’re facing every challenge, good or bad, as team together,” said Patrice Bergeron, who scored a goal in his first game back after missing the previous seven. “That’s what we are as a team and that’s what we’re going to do. There are things and parts of our game that need to be rectified. There are also some parts of our game that we need to realize as well. It’s finding the balance. It’s just another challenge, a bump in the road.”
The Senators were playing their first home game after a five-game road trip, usually a guarantee for a slow start. But for the fourth time in six games, the B’s allowed the first goal of the game, this time on a defensive lapse.
Defenseman Dylan DeMelo caught the B’s defensemen John Moore and Matt Grzelcyk flat-footed at the Ottawa blue line and sent a beautiful pass straight up the middle of the ice for Artem Anisimov for a breakaway. Charlie Coyle was just coming onto the ice and gave chase but Anisimov was able to get a backhander off that beat Tuuka Rask just 1:35 into the game.
Again, the B’s were not good early. They nearly went down by two goals a few minutes later when a Connor Brown shot produced a perfect rebound for Brady Tkachuk on a 2-on-1. Tkachuk had an open net but his stick shattered in his hands and the puck went just wide.
The B’s did get a couple of chances to tie it, none better than Danton Heinen off a pretty Jake DeBrusk setup, but Anders Nilsson stoned Heinen with the right pad.
But the Sens did take a 2-0 lead at 15:44 on something of a bad break. Grzelcyk’s pass behind the net to Moore took a bad bounce off the glass and went right to Chris Tierney, who spotted Anthony Duclair in the slot. Duclair buried his 14th goal past Rask’s glove arm at 15:44.
The B’s, however, got one back before the period was out at 17:48. Mark Borowiecki tried to break up Brad Marchand near the Ottawa blue line but Marchand got the puck to David Pastrnak for a quick 2-on-1. With all of Nilsson’s focus on the 25-goal scorer, Pastrnak simply moved it over to Bergeron, who had a wide open net into which he deposited his ninth of the season.
But if that goal was to give the B’s momentum, they had a funny way of showing it. The B’s handed the two-goal lead right back to the Sens at 1:29 of the second on a sloppy play by Rask. Playing the puck behind the net after a failed rush by Duclair, Rask threw a blind pass behind him where the only man there was the Sens’ Vladislav Namestnikov. Rask tried to scramble back in the net but it wasn’t before Namestnikov found an open Tierney for a way-too-easy goal.
The Sens gave the B’s chances to get back in the game, taking three consecutive penalties. But though Nilsson was forced to make some high quality saves, the Senators survived all three kills and even forced some decent shorthanded chances to preserve their two-goal lead going into the second break.
Late in the third, the B’s got another power play and Cassidy pulled Rask for an extra skater but before they could generate a meaningful attack on the 6-on-4, Torey Krug had a shot blocked and Jean-Gabriel Pageau took off the other way for a empty-netter wth 2:58 left.
“I had a few of those (Monday) and I’ve just got to be better,” said Krug. “Just move it around so you get the chance that you get. We have a bunch of guys out there that can make plays and shoot the puck. Unfortunately I made a poor shot selection. Over the course of a lot of games I’m going to do that, other guys are going to do that. Unfortunately it put the dagger in the game for us.”
Jake DeBrusk added one with 2:13 left but another comeback was not in the cards. Duclair added his second, an empty-netter, in the final second.
