BOSTON –- The Bruins didn’t lose quite as listlessly on Saturday night to Montreal as they did on opening night to the Winnipeg Jets, but that isn’t exactly saying all that much.
The Bruins continued to make costly turnovers and blow defensive assignments. But the Black and Gold were also dominated during 5-on-5 play in the puck possession category in a 4-2 loss to the Montreal Canadiens at TD Garden on Saturday night.
It wasn’t a very encouraging effort against Boston’s archrivals; a dreadful penalty kill put them down on the scoreboard early, and once again the wheels fell off in the second period amid some defensive mistakes. The Bruins also embarked on a parade to the penalty box in the third while down a couple of goals.
The bottom line for the B’s: they were outshot 38-20 in a feeble offensive performance, and made it too easy for the Canadiens at Boston’s end of the ice.
Claude Julien is preaching puck patience while his young players and newcomers find their footing with the Bruins, but that’s easier said than done at this point.
David Pastrnak had a tough turnover and D-zone shift that led to one goal, and Matt Irwin was on the ice for another couple of goals. The Bruins had some tough luck as well with bad penalty calls against them, and a goal waved off that should have counted once Julien used his coach's challenge on the goalie interference.
“We’re definitely young, so there’s no doubt that played a part in our game tonight. We’ve got to get better in certain areas, we’ve got to keep working on it and those young guys are going to get better if they keep playing and getting some experience. We’re going through some growing pains,” said Julien. “The thing I liked is no matter what we stayed with it, we killed a lot of penalties in the third period, and we got another goal to try and get ourselves back into it.
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“I thought the guys kind of at least had the right attitude whether we did it right or wrong hockey-wise, we had the right attitude to try and at least keep ourselves in this game.”
Undoubtedly there was some kind of moral victory in the Bruins refusing to allow things to get out of hand, as they did two nights prior against the Jets. That’s a half step in the right direction, but there’s also clearly a great deal of comprehensive work to be done.
Outside of Matt Beleskey, David Krejci and Pastrnak, the Bruins have to get things together offensively, and find some ways to generate consistent pressure in the offensive zone.
Above and beyond that, the Bruins need to play a good team defensive game with layers and a grinding attitude, and find a way to sustain some puck possession amid a ramshackle group of B’s defensemen.
That’s a lot easier said than done and will require plenty of patience as the Bruins endure more “growing pains” throughout the early portions of the season.