The Bruins lost their first game under new Bruins head coach Joe Sacco in another hardnosed defensive effort where there simply wasn’t enough offensive production for the two points.
The lack of offense isn’t exactly a surprise for a Black and Gold group that’s struggled all season in that area.
It wasn’t for a lack of trying, of course, as the Bruins leveled over 70 shots on net and had the greater number of scoring chances over an ultimately frustrating 60 minutes of hockey for the Black and Gold in a 2-0 loss to the Canucks at TD Garden on Tuesday night. But the Canucks blocked 26 shots and played consistently tenacious defense while goalie Kevin Lankinen made 33 saves while playing in place of the injured Thatcher Demko.
Sometimes a hockey team gives an opposing goalie an easy night when a shutout happens, but this was not one of those kinds of games. The Bruins had the massive advantage in terms of shot attempts (72-31) and Grade-A scoring chances but were left trying to find positives after everything they threw at the Vancouver net was turned away.
“[Lankinen] was, you know, First, Second and Third Star,” said Canucks coach Rick Tocchet. “He was very good tonight. Saw the puck extremely well. They’re tough saves he made tonight, really tough.”
Lankinen made saves on David Pastrnak breakaways, turned away net-front chances for Justin Brazeau and Morgan Geekie and then held up in the game’s final seconds with the Jeremy Swayman pulled at the other end.
The game’s final seconds really typified the whole game as Elias Lindholm had a point-blank chance after Lankinen stopped a slick Brad Marchand redirect at the net front, and Lindholm proceeded to fire a shot that deflected off Marchand before bouncing harmlessly away from the net.
“We just have to start burying our chances,” Boston interim coach Joe Sacco said. “I think that we’re giving ourselves a chance to compete in games now. The guys are defending hard, like I mentioned before, but offensively, we have to get some guys going and find their scoring touch.”
The other part of a growing trend for the Bruins, though, is the lack of offensive finish in these last three games since the coaching change. The Bruins have now scored a grand total of three goals in the last three games, which on the one hand has won them a pair of hard-fought defensive efforts.
On the other hand, it’s not a sustainable level of offense to win NHL hockey games and the Bruins widely acknowledge this as they try to avoid getting frustrated after a game where the Canucks clearly were frustrating them with blocked shots, active sticks and unwillingness to allow them to set up offensively.
“The dam is going to break at some point,” said Boston defenseman Charlie McAvoy, who had seven shot attempts in another active game at both ends of the ice. “You just hope it’s soon. We just got to keep playing the right way. We’re stressing defense in here, and we’re doing a great job of it, you know, and I think it has helped our offensive game. We just can’t score [right now].”
The other notable aspect of the loss was Jake DeBrusk looming large in his return to Boston after signing a big free-agent deal last summer with the Canucks. DeBrusk and old friend Danton Heinen got the video tribute treatment in their first game back in Boston, and a solid reception from the home B’s fans as well.
Welcome back, Jake DeBrusk and Danton Heinen 🥹#NHLBruins pic.twitter.com/G2YjfOleG2
— NESN (@NESN) November 27, 2024
But some of Boston’s offensive struggles this season, in general, are attributable to the B’s not adequately replacing DeBrusk’s speed, skill and game-breaking ability on the wing. That was on display at one end as the Bruins couldn’t finish off any offensive plays, and at the other end where DeBrusk potted the game-winning power play goal that provided the winning difference for Vancouver.
DeBrusk finished with five shot attempts and the goal in 16:44 of ice time after shoveling home a puck that deflected straight to him off Conor Garland’s glove at the net front in the decisive second period. Basically, the Canucks got a bounce, and the Bruins did not in the game, but it was also instructive that DeBrusk was the difference-maker at a time when his old team is really scrounging around for offense.
Jake DeBrusk scores in his return to Boston! 🐳
— NHL (@NHL) November 27, 2024
📺: @Sportsnet or stream on Sportsnet+ pic.twitter.com/CTB0AiGFLw
“You can think about anything you want to think about, but once push comes to shove and you’re on the ice, it’s about getting the two points,” said DeBrusk. “Obviously it means a lot to a guy like me to pull out the win. I thought they played a great game, actually. I think that’s the best I’ve seen them, shooting pucks from everywhere, and we just kind of played a defensive style.”
The bottom line is that DeBrusk showed some of the goal-scoring that left with him to Vancouver, and the Bruins are still dead last in the NHL averaging 2.22 goals per game and also dead last in the NHL with a 12.4 percent success rate on the power play. Those numbers are probably beginning to wear on some of Boston’s best offensive players and take the confidence level down a notch even with the most swaggering goal producers.
Either that trend needs to reverse course, or the Bruins are going to need to make a move for another legit top-6 winger capable of scoring goals in addition to the coaching change milk that’s already been spilled.
Even the best defensive efforts in the world aren’t going to win 0-0 hockey games at the NHL level as the Black and Gold discovered once again in frustrating defeat to a Canucks team that’s clearly found a good road recipe having won their eighth game in a row on the road against the exasperated Bruins.