Bedard: Bruins a complete no-show in worst season-opening loss in team history

WASHINGTON — This is the 94th season for the Boston Bruins, who were founded in 1924. They have fielded all sorts of teams during that long history, from six Stanley Cup winners to the six-win inaugural team.

None of the previous 93 versions of the Bruins lost a season-opening game by more than five goals. The 2018-19 B's opened their campaign with a 7-0 drubbing at the hands of the defending champion Washington Capitals on Wednesday night.

"It was embarrassing to be out there," said alternate captain Patrice Bergeron.

That about sums it up. From the puck drop — the Bruins gave up the first goal 24 seconds in and trailed 2-0 in the first 1:47 — Boston was completely outplayed, outcoached and outclassed by the Capitals.

Sure, the Caps are obviously talented and a real threat to defend the banner they raised in an over-the-top ceremony before the game. But that wasn't the problem last night. The Bruins' lack of fight was.

"Well, it was a lot, but I think our lack of competitive spirit," said Bruce Cassidy, when asked what he was most disappointed in. "It’s opening night … (you figured) guys would be a little hungrier to play. Got ourselves behind the 8-ball early. Clearly we weren’t ready to go and it just carried on from there.

"Did I expect this? No. I did not expect this effort. I expected a much better effort. You never know what the end result is going to be, but I did not expect this effort, no. I expected us to play like typically the Bruins do … we’re hard to play against, we defend the slot, we’re on top of people but none of that happened tonight."

The Bruins were outshot in every period (13-9, 12-6, 12-10) but that doesn't tell the tale. It seemed on every shift the Capitals had free reign through the neutral zone and terrific opportunities shooting on Rask, who, after the first two goals, settled down to give the Bruins a chance to finish the period.

"They came out hard and we just didn’t have any pushback," said Brad Marchand. We got down early and we have to be able to push back in situations like that. It’s a 2-0 game with essentially the whole game left. We have to be able to push back and we weren’t able to do that tonight.

"That’s kind of our backbone of our team, work ethic and competitiveness. They’re a really good team, defending champs, and we had to have our best game to compete with them and we didn’t."

After the initial goal, Zdeno Chara tried to light a fire under his teammates by laying a crushing hit on T.J. Oshie in the neutral zone. But even that fell flat. Bergeron won the draw in the defensive zone, but Chara whiffed on the bouncing puck, it slid by Rask and Evgeny Kuznetsov put it in the net for a 2-0 lead.

https://twitter.com/Capitals/status/1047637892762427392

Cassidy had issues with his veteran group after the game. Chara, Bergeron, Marchand and Pastrnak were each a minus-2.

"I think our core in general needed to be a lot better," Cassidy said. "They’re supposed to be the leaders and come out and play like that and the kids follow. But neither the leading nor the following happened tonight."

The Bruins had a chance to get back into the game to start the second period, but the Capitals scored three times on three shots to take a 5-0 lead and Rask was pulled for Jaroslav Halak.

"I'm out there to give us a chance, didn't happen today," said Rask. "Faced three soft goals, have to look in the mirror and fix it. ... I felt fine. It’s just one of those games that you can’t find it and make the saves. The last one was a great example of that. That fifth goal just goes off my skate, bad angle shot and I don’t think there’s any other choice for a coach. I have nothing against that."

Halak had 16 saves on eighteen shots (.889 save percentage), compared to Rask's 14 on 19 (.737). That will do nothing to quell the Tuukka's overrated chorus.

"He played well," Cassidy said of Halak. "He was, I guess, our best player. It’s probably never good when your backup goalie is your best player but I thought he really played well."

Cassidy, who doesn't really shy away from criticizing his players, didn't have many biting comments about Rask.

"I don’t know if it would have mattered, to be honest with you, I really don’t," Cassidy said when asked if he thought about pulling Rask after the fourth goal. "There’s some nights when your goalie doesn’t have it and your players think, ‘Well, we’ll get them tomorrow.’ But I don’t see that as the case tonight. He made some saves in the first period. The second one was a funny one, happened quick and obviously, in the second period it got away from him, but I’m not putting this on Tuukka."

The good news for the Bruins is that they get right back on the horse Thursday night with a game against the Sabres in Buffalo. Everyone will know if this was a blip or a sign of things to come.

"It’s (expletive) one game, it's nothing, we’ll let it go and worry about tomorrow, tomorrow," said Marchand.

Cassidy had made no secret of his feelings that he didn't feel the Bruins were quite ready for the season after a disjointed training camp in which half the team was in China dealing with equipment clearing customs and choppy ice. No one would offer that as an excuse for a franchise-worst performance, but they weren't dismissing it either.

"Yeah, it’s been a different training camp for sure," said Bergeron. "We’re obviously not going to use that as an excuse but the last few games we saw it creep in a little bit and it was something we talked about. We had some good practices this week and I thought guys were pretty sharp. But a lot of work to do, to say the least, I guess. ... We have to be a lot better and hopefully, we can use tomorrow’s game as quick refresh and reset."