If you are an optimistic kind of Bruins fan – and, granted, your population is dwindling at the moment – you are just waiting for the pendulum to swing back in the team’s favor. You’ve seen it happen once already. Surely it can happen again.
Right?
Well, that’s the hope anyway. After the 4-1 loss in Buffalo on Saturday when the Sabres had more goals (3) in the second period than the Bruins had shots (2), the B’s are riding a five-game losing streak (0-4-1), one short of their longest skid of futility, which was six straight L’s in October when it looked like the team was not grasping new coach Marco Sturm’s hybrid man/zone defensive system.
But they pulled out of that nosedive in time to make it look like they would compete for a playoff spot. That is still on the table, as they are technically just one point out of a wild card position. But they have looked nothing like a playoff team lately.
When the players arrived Sunday at the Keybank Arena, the site of the latest crime, the forward lines had been thrown into the proverbial blender. The top line of Morgan Geekie-Elias Lindholm-David Pastrnak had been split up. Rookie Fraser Minten, who was praised by the coach for his heady play, was centering Pastrnak and Marat Khusnutdinov while Lindholm was between Geekie and Alex Steeves.
While Sturm told reporters in Buffalo that he wasn’t committed to those combinations when they resume action in Calgary on Monday, a change seems due. The plus-minus stat does not tell the whole story of a player, but when your leading scorer like Pastrnak is a minus-12, he’s not contributing to the cause of winning enough.
“We wanted to change something today. I think it just helps a guy like David, because he can skate and Khus can skate so maybe it will help him, too,” Sturm told reporters in Buffalo of the new combinations.
Though the top line produced the only goal on a nice play on Saturday, they often seemed disconnected from each other. As with a receiver who is not on the same page with his quarterback, passes were off the mark because intended targets stopped skating.
Considering the situation, the line shakeup was hardly a surprise.
“Nature of the business I guess, right?” said Geekie. “It’s a results driven league and we’re not producing and … we aren’t winning games, at the end of the day it’s tough to keep things the same. We have a great group of guys here and we’re all comfortable playing with each other, so it’s no surprise that there was a little bit of change today.”
On Saturday, there were costly mistakes all over the ice. The roof began to creak thanks to an offensive zone turnover. When the B’s were up 1-0, Geekie tried to pass the puck back to the point but it was picked off and went the other way for a Buffalo rush goal. A Steeves’ defensive zone turnover led to what would be the GWG. Finally, a Khusnutdinov unforced icing led to the third goal against. The Sabres, looking like an actual NHL team these days, weren’t giving up that lead.
“We gave up way too many pucks (Saturday) night because we didn’t protect it, we didn’t keep them, we didn’t battle enough. We didn’t do anything,” said Sturm. “It kind of goes both ways. On the defensive side of it, we want to better, but on the offensive side, don’t forget that we turned pucks over, we give it to them, basically, and that’s why we end up in our zone. You’ve always got to know where it comes from, and (Saturday) night it came from the O-zone.”
The defense corps remained the same in practice. But once they get some injured players back, that no doubt will change as well. Jonathan Aspirot has been out since suffering an upper body injury on Dec. 11 and is with the team on the road. He participated in practice on Sunday, as did Henri Jokiharju, though it didn’t sound like Sturm was expecting either of them to be available for the Calgary game.
It may be unfair to put too much on the return of a stay-at-home defenseman who didn’t make the team out of camp like Aspirot. But, in his own way, he was very much an impact player, posting a plus-8 in 19 games. During the time of the Charlie McAvoy injury, the left-shot defenseman was essentially getting top pairing assignments with Nikita Zadorov while playing his right side. He’s unspectacular, but he skates well, closes fast and brings some physicality. He appears to be made for Sturm’s system.
Aspirot would help. And right now, the B’s could use all the help they can get. … The rehabbing taxi squad was pared down a couple of bodies on Sunday. Matej Blumel and Michael Callahan, both out with lower body injuries, were activated off injured reserve and sent back to Providence.
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