Let’s forget about the Bruins 4-1 loss Tuesday night to the Vegas Golden Knights for a minute and focus on the bigger picture here as things got a whole lot worse on Wednesday.
A day after Brad Marchand and Craig Smith were placed into the NHL’s COVID protocol, Patrice Bergeron was also added to the list.
Like Marchand and Smith, even if asymptomatic, Bergeron must quarantine for 10 days.
So, without Bergeron, Marchand and Smith for at least the next five games, where do the Bruins go from here?
“You hope the guys still play within themselves and you got to tighten up in other areas,… said head coach Bruce Cassidy. “Certainly, when you lose offense, you’ve got to get good defense.…
As a team that relies way too much on their top line, losing two thirds of that top trio is certainly less than ideal. Factor in the loss of Smith and now you’re without half of your top-six.
We saw on Tuesday what the Marchand and Smith-less Bruins looked like—spoiler alert, not good—now we will see how worse it gets without Bergeron, if, the Bruins even get to play their next scheduled game, Thursday in New York against the Islanders.
Jack Studnicka and Oskar Steen were recalled on an emergency basis for Tuesday night, but neither cracked the lineup. That’s likely to change on Thursday, should the game be played.
“I'm just going by the reports from the different people in our organization that give us Providence updates. Steen's been a little more consistent, but Jack was good at training camp, so that is the last viewing I saw of him other than a few games he's played here and there,… Cassidy said. “We'd like to see some growth there as well from our young players that are getting a chance to play.…
How exactly the Bruins four lines will shake out for Thursday remain to be seen, but wherever they land, they certainly won’t be pretty.
"We have to have a conversation about what's best for the group,… added Cassidy. “There's different ways we could do it. You might see a variety of it this weekend until we see what we have."
After Thursday’s contest in New York, the Bruins were scheduled to head north to Canada for Saturday’s game in Montreal and Sunday’s contest in Ottawa. Given the risk of crossing the border into Canada and having a player test positive, forcing an even longer quarantine, there’s a real chance that this weekend’s games in Canada are postponed.
The Bruins will instead spend Thursday night in New York, reducing the time spent out of the country. Given the issues of teams around the league, don’t be surprised if the Bruins lose more players to COVID in the coming days.
Now, as for Tuesday.
It was by far the Bruins worst game of the season as they trailed 3-0 after the first period. Given the issues with COVID and the first game back home after a three-game road trip to western Canada, it would have been easy to pin the loss on one of those excuses.
Taylor Hall was having none of that.
“We played three games with (Marchand) out, and I thought we played well. We did our best in his absence. Everyone knows what he does for our team, and I thought we did a good job making up for that when he was out with his suspension,… said Hall.
“I can’t really buy into the excuses, the travel or the COVID stuff. Every team deals with it. It is what it is. We have to respond and have to get better.…
The biggest surprise to me since Hall has arrived has been the accountability piece. On a team where he doesn’t have to be a vocal leader or be the one to hold players accountable, including himself, he does.
You can see it in his body language, you can hear it in his voice. When he says something, he means it. That is nothing something I knew of when Hall got to Boston and something I have much respect for since.
In their loss to Vegas, the Bruins seemed like a team that was simply not ready to go from the jump. They lacked energy and were outworked in every area of the game.
"I think early on, it took us a while to check in, and that could be a number of things. Mentally, I thought we weren't there early,… said Cassidy. “We were standing still a lot in situations against this type of neutral zone where they played. We had to be moving better."
With their issues surrounding COVID, and who they’re missing, it sure seems like things are going to get worse before they get better.
Want to take a positive out of this, any positive?
Maybe Studnicka gets the chance to center Hall and David Pastrnak and that jump starts him offensively?
Fingers crossed.