What a difference 37 seconds can make. If the Bruins had managed to hang on for 37 more seconds Wednesday night in Denver, they would have had a signature win over the red-hot Avalanche.
They would have ended the Avs’ 16-game home winning streak and handed them just their second regulation loss since Dec. 2. They would have been celebrating a great performance from Linus Ullmark, who had made several great saves in the third to preserve the lead. Jake DeBrusk scoring and continuing to play well would have been another highlight.
But Boston couldn’t hang on. The Avalanche tied the game with the extra attacker when Nazem Kadri set up Gabriel Landeskog. Then Colorado won in overtime on a power-play goal from Cale Makar to extend its home winning streak to 17 games.
The Bruins still got a point, which is a result most teams would take given how great the Avs have been. Make no mistake, though: This wasn’t a “good” point. This wasn’t a moral victory.
This was a game the Bruins should have won. They had a two-goal lead in the third period. They were facing a Colorado team that didn’t have star center Nathan MacKinnon, who was knocked out of the game early in the first period when a hard but clean hit from Taylor Hall knocked MacKinnon’s own stick into his face.
The Avalanche nearly handed the Bruins the game by prioritizing getting revenge on Hall over playing hockey in the second period. Erik Johnson gave them an extended 5-on-3 by foolishly crosschecking Hall three times while the B’s were already on the power play. Goals from Charlie Coyle and Brad Marchand followed and the Bruins suddenly had a 3-1 lead.
In the third period, it was the Bruins who stopped playing hockey, according to their coach. They wound up pinned in their own zone defending and generated little in the way of offensive zone time that could have relieved some of the pressure.
“I think the biggest thing for me is watching us play the whole period in our own end because we couldn’t execute a breakout pass,” Bruce Cassidy said. “We continually iced it, off the glass and out. You have to keep playing hockey. They’re too good. You’re going to get fatigued. Sure enough, they start winning some faceoffs and we’re pulling it out of our net.
“You have to keep playing. Then when you don’t, you have to play winning hockey, protect the middle of the ice. … At the end of the day, we didn’t get it done. We didn’t get it done. We typically do in those situations. We paid the price.”
It was exactly how the Bruins don’t want to play when they’re protecting a third-period lead. As Cassidy explained over the weekend, they want to be on the attack and looking to extend their lead, not sitting back and just trying to block shots and flip pucks out of the zone.
The Avalanche are arguably the best team in the NHL. Even with MacKinnon out of the game, holding onto a lead against them wasn’t going to be easy. But this was a game the Bruins needed to close out, no matter who the opponent was.
Expectations have shifted for the Bruins. They have played like one of the better teams in the league this month, and that means that almost beating a top team like the Avs or still getting a point in a tough road game isn’t good enough -- not when they had a two-goal lead with 10 minutes to go.
They let their goalie down, and they allowed what could have been a victory worth celebrating to turn into a disappointing night.
“I think we expected a push. We wanted to keep playing the same,” Coyle said. “They came hard. Yeah, it’s unfortunate. Linus played such a great game, and he deserved better from us in the third.”
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