The Bruins left Boston on Thursday with the feeling that being on the road and away from the holiday distractions of home would help them focus on the task at hand.
That was the theory, anyway.
The reality was that the B’s played arguably their worst game of the season in Friday against the Winnipeg Jets at Canada Life Centre, dropping a 5-1 decision that was as lopsided as the score indicated.
Coach Jim Montgomery was asked what bothered him most about the performance.
“Our compete level,” Montgomery told NESN. “We didn’t win enough one-on-one battles and it started in the faceoff circle (43 percent) and just spiraled downhill from there.”
The B’s now have to get their act together to face a hot Wild team in St. Paul on Saturday.
Though the B’s had been much more competitive in their previous two games, both overtime losses, it was the B’s third straight loss and one that, if it came at a different point in the schedule, might precipitate a message-sending call-up from Providence.
The B’s got only token pressure on Winnipeg goalie Connor Hellebuyck when it mattered and, even then, it was of the one-and-done variety. The power outage is getting concerning. They have been held to one goal in three of their last five games.
On Friday, Brad Marchand was held without a shot and David Pastrnak got one. If the power outage continues much longer, the B’s may have no choice to but to take a look at prospect Georgii Merkulov, who’s been tearing it up in Providence lately.
On the other hand, the defense wasn’t all that great, either.
After being thoroughly outplayed for most opening period, it looked like the B’s might escape into the first break with a scoreless game.
Jeremy Swayman was the B’s best player in the opening 20 minutes and he had to be. The B’s allowed a couple of the odd-man rushes in the early going and it appeared that they had scored on one but it was ruled that Josh Morrissey had kicked the puck into the net at 2:29.
The B’s were barely able to get out of their zone and, when they did, they’d give it right back to the Jets in the neutral zone.
But the B’s started to spend a little more time in the offensive zone late in the period and appeared to be in good position to head into the intermission in good shape. But with less than 30 seconds left in the period, Charlie McAvoy decided to go on the attack and it blew up on the B’s. He took the puck in deep in the right and tried a backdoor pass intended for Pavel Zacha that did not connect.
That sent Mark Scheifele off the other way on a 2-on-1 with Gabe Vilardi, whose initial shot was stopped by Swayman but the puck trickled into the slot. Brad Marchand was there, but he couldn’t get a handle on it and Morrissey popped it home for a goal that would stand up with just 7.8 seconds left in the period.
“That’s just unfortunate,” Swayman told reporters in Winnepeg. “We want to end periods and to have this trend that’s happening now of getting scored on in the last minute is unacceptable. So we’re going to do everything we need to do, talk about it as a team and really dial it in in the last minute, for sure.”
Still, the B’s seemed to be unaffected by the late goal, as they played a little better to start the second. They earned the first power play of the game, with which they could do nothing. Then they easily killed off a Winnipeg power play.
But at 11:17, the Jets doubled their lead. From the right corner, Nik Ehlers tried to sneak a pass through Brandon Carlo to Vilardi at the left post. Carlo got a skate on it and Swayman actually made a great save on the deflection, but Vilardi was there to bang the rebound home.
The Jets made it 3-0 on an eventful power play. In the midst of the Winnipeg advantage, Parker Wotherspoon gloved in aerial puck while he was in the crease, resulting in a penalty shot. Mark Scheifele took it and Swayman stoned him with the blocker.
But with 30 seconds still left on the Winnipeg PP, the B’s couldn’t close out the kill. From the left point, Nate Schmidt made a fake to Cole Perfetti in the right circle, inducing Hampus Lindholm to chase. That left Nino Niederreiter all alone at the right post and, after Schmidt connected, he had a wide open net at 17:41.
That put the B’s in a three-goal hole going into the third period and, considering they’d managed just 13 shots on Hellebuyck through 40 minutes, it was doubtful they could make that climb.
Just 1:25 into the third, the Jets’ Adam Lowry used his big body to hold off McAvoy and Kevin Shattenkirk at the top of the crease to tap in Mason Appleton’s pass too easily.
Carlo broke up Hellebuyck’s shutout bid in garbage time before Niederreiter scored another power play goal in the final minute.
