Monday Blues hit Bruins hard
New week begins poorly after surge
This is why nobody likes Mondays.
Or losing an hour of sleep.
Fresh off one of their best weeks of the season, the Bruins started off a new one with a sluggish 5-1 loss to the Blues at TD Garden.
It wasn’t like the Bruins were completely outclassed — they dominated their guests territorially for most of the night — but they gave up too many odd-man rushes and had trouble consistently connecting and finishing on offense.
Oh, and Blues goalie Joel Hofer played like a HoFer. Jordan Binnington’s backup stopped 36 shotsand allowed precious few rebounds for the Bruins to pounce on.
Only David Pastrnak’s 41st goal of the season, a third-period rocket from the blue line with the Blues comfortably ahead, 4-0, got past Hofer.
Jim Montgomery’s team collected 7 of 8 points last week but will have to wait until Thursday night in Montreal, the coach’s hometown, to try to erase the memory of this one.
“We just didn’t have the same emotion we played with the last four games,” Brad Marchand said. “We’re at our best when we do play emotional, when we play tight, we play together, play physical, move as a unit, and when we play above teams. We didn’t do that.
“We gave them way too many odd-man rushes and dangerous looks. We knew they were a rush team. We talked about it before the game, and we didn’t do a good enough job being above there to get their guys and playing behind them. So that’s what happens.”
Trailing, 4-1, with just over eight minutes remaining, the Bruins (38-14-15) pulled Jeremy Swayman in an attempt to get back in the game, but the Blues (33-29-3) quickly extended the lead on Alexey Toropchenko’s
empty-netter.
Despite outshooting and outchancing the Blues through the first 20 minutes, the Bruins were looking up at a 2-0 deficit as they headed to the dressing room.
The St. Louis goals came via a quirky bounce and one too many Boston penalties.
The Bruins had the first chance on the power play when Brayden Schenn interfered with Marchand just 53 seconds in. There was nothing doing on the man advantage for the Bruins, who couldn’t establish any rhythm.
The Blues broke the ice midway through the period.
Old friend Torey Krug’s dump-in to the corner clanged off the referee’s skate and ricocheted right to the slot, where an unmarked Kasperi Kapanen caught the puck and ripped it past Swayman (17 saves).
Boston had several golden chances to pull even but Jake DeBrusk (forehander off a speed rush), Jakub Lauko (slot backhander off a nifty Justin Brazeau feed), and Pastrnak (partial breakaway) were all turned aside by Hofer.
The Bruins survived a holding the stick call on DeBrusk, but back-to-back calls on Charlie Coyle (hooking) and Trent Frederic (high sticking) gave the visitors a five-onthree and it took them just 10 seconds to cash in. Robert Thomas played give-and-go with Justin Faulk before slapping one past Swayman from the top of the left circle for a 2-0 lead.
DeBrusk nearly put Boston on the board in the opening moments of the second, but his doorstep jam couldn’t squeeze through Hofer.
St. Louis went up, 3-0, on another oddman break. Kapanen dropped a pass to Kevin Hayes in the slot and the Dorchester homie buried it.
“There’s a breakdown there,” Montgomery said. “You give up a three-on-one off an O-zone faceoff, there’s a breakdown by a couple of players.”
The Bruins appeared to crack the crease when Brazeau’s airborne backhander in tight bounced over Hofer and into the net, but the celebration was short-lived. The Bruins were ruled offside.
“I thought initially that maybe because their defenseman hit the puck back that it was going to be a good goal,” said Montgomery, no doubt echoing the thoughts of the packed Garden. “They explained that it was not a possession play, it was a battle play for the puck and our guy was in before the puck clearly.”
With a lot of the life sucked out of the building, the Blues went ahead, 4-0, when Brandon Saad kicked one off his skate blade onto his stick blade and slid it in at the left post.
If there was a silver lining to the loss it was the play of the fourth line of Jesper Boqvist, Lauko, and Brazeau. The trio consistently provided energy and giddyup throughout.
“Yeah, got to give their line a lot of credit,” Marchand said. “They tried to pull us in the fight all night long, played the right way, had a lot of really good opportunities, really good looks, and we’re going to need them to continue to be like that down the stretch here.”