B’s can’t get it going
Lightning pull into East tie
TAMPA — The Bruins are still in the driver’s seat for the Eastern Conference crown, but they made the road ahead a lot more challenging last night.
With a chance to put a stranglehold on the East, the B’s were thoroughly outplayed by the Tampa Bay Lightning, losing 4-0 at Amalie Arena, their first loss to Tampa Bay in four tries this season.
The victory pulled the Bolts into a points tie with the B’s at 110 but the Bruins have a game in hand. The Lightning hold the first tiebreaker in regulation/ overtime wins (47-46), plus have two games left, at Buffalo on Friday and at home against Carolina on Saturday. The Bruins have three left, at Florida tomorrow, then at home against Ottawa on Saturday and Florida on Sunday.
If the B’s capture five of their last six points, they’ll win the East. That, however, may be a tough ask for a Bruins team that looked like it was paying the price for the last month of every-other-night play.
The Bolts dominated a scoreless first period, scored three unanswered goals in the second and then cruised to victory in the third. The loss snapped an 11-game point streak for Tuukka Rask (10-0-1), who was under siege.
While it was one of the B’s worst performances in a while, coach Bruce Cassidy did not allow for an excuse.
“I just think they hadn’t beaten us this year and they were determined to do that,” said Cassidy. “In the first period we were clearly outplayed for the most part, yet we came out of 0-0. I thought the second period we actually didn’t give up as many quality chances, and three of them went in. That’s the way it goes sometimes. If we could have fought through there and got us a save or two early on, maybe we find our game around the front of their net.
“But they had more urgency there than we did. I don’t know if that’s fatigue. I just think their game plan was to funnel everything at the net and I don’t think we did enough of that. And the third goal’s a good example. We got outworked in front of our net and that kind of put the game away.”
Rask played well enough in a first period to withstand a 17-8 shot disadvantage, but it fell apart in the second period, though at first it appeared that the B’s took the lead at 3:39 when Brian Gionta corralled an aerial puck and beat Andrei Vasilevskiiy with a shot along the ice. But the goal was waved off immediately when it was ruled that Gionta got the puck by using a high stick, It appeared to be the right call.
Then at 5:01, the Bolts got the first go-ahead goal of the season series on a shot Rask would have liked back. Nikita Kucherov made a good rush through the neutral zone before dishing over to Brayden Point on the right side. Point took a shot that Rask missed with his blocker.
“I don’t know if it dropped a little or not, but I just missed it, I guess,” said Rask, who faced 36 shots. “It doesn’t happen too often I hope.”
Victor Hedman doubled the lead with a back foot slapper that made it just inside the far post at 10:59.
The Lightning then took a 3-0 advantage at 14:27 when the B’s were gassed on a shift. First, Ryan Callahan beat Torey Krug on a potential icing and, though the B’s cleared the zone, the defensemen couldn’t get off the ice. On an ensuing rush, Callahan got around Krug to get off a bad angle shot. Rask stopped it, but Nick Holden could not clear and Chris Kunitz scored on the rebound.
Asked about Rask’s play, Cassidy said: “He’s been better and I think he’d be the first to tell you that. Two goals from distance. The second one might have been through traffic, obviously, but the first one can’t go in. Having said that, we didn’t score so it might not have mattered, to be honest. But I don’t think he was as sharp as he has been of late.”
This time there were no miracle comebacks by the Bruins in the third. J.T. Miller scored on a shortside shot on a 2-on-1 2:34 into the third and Vasilevskiiy stopped 33 shots to nail down the shutout.