The inconsistent performances continued during Boston’s first-ever visit to Utah on Saturday night.
After a slow start, Matias Maccelli and Utah turned it on late to hand David Pastrnak and the Bruins a loss in their first trip to Utah..
Jim Montgomery’s club struggled to contain Utah’s speed and counterattack, prompting the Bruins into frequent turnovers and penalty trouble.
Jeremy Swayman stood tall amid heavy pressure, keeping Boston afloat with another steady outing. Eventually, the Bruins found their footing and put themselves within striking distance of two points following Cole Koepke’s second-period marker.
The sloppy habits carried over throughout Saturday’s tilt. Swayman, Koepke, nor a successful offside challenge could bail the Bruins out of a blown coverage on Vladislav Kolyachonok’s equalizer late in regulation or an ill-timed penalty from David Pastrnak leading directly to Micahel Keselring’s overtime winner.
Between the Cup Final loss in 2019 and the two recent postseason eliminations to Florida, the Bruins struggled to contain heavier teams with aggressive forechecks.
Don Sweeney tried to address those shortcomings over the summer, adding size and strength to Boston’s back end and bottom-six depth. Perhaps that will come in handy during the tight-checking nature of playoff hockey. Yet, against speedier teams — and even the more physical ones — the Bruins have struggled to land an effective counter.
“We knew coming in we were going to play hard defense and not mess around with the puck,” Koepke told reporters. “Their forwards, especially on the wings, are small, fast, skilled and like to make plays. We just didn’t close it out at the end of the game, and it’s disappointing for us.”
Without Swayman’s bailout efforts during the first 20 and the final stretch, the Bruins would’ve left Utah with nothing. In between, Swayman’s teammates did a slightly better job containing Utah’s speed down the middle of the ice.
A case in point came after Marchand created a turnover near the defending blue line to create a chance in transition for Koepke. The former Lightning product put the finishing touches on his fourth goal of the season after firing a wrister from the faceoff dot past Connor Ingram for Boston’s lone tally.
“They’re very skilled, very fast,” Marchand told the media. “At parts, I thought we did a good job at playing behind them and playing above their speed and reloading. But we need to do more of that. We were trying to play in the middle a lot. They’re not very physical. They’re trying to read the play and pick passes off through the middle there, and we’re not built like that. We have to play behind teams and be heavier on it. So we need to be better at that.”
“We never felt like we were in control of the game,” Montgomery told NESN’s Andy Brickley. “We were turning the puck over too much, and our puck support really up until the five minutes before we gave up the tying goal was actually the best we played with puck support and puck possession.”
With 5:09 remaining in regulation, a coverage breakdown led to Kolyanchonok getting past Brandon Carlo into a mini-breakaway attempt. Swayman, who had stopped the first 26 shots he faced — sans Kailer Yamamoto’s overturned goal from the offside review — fell victim to Kolyanchonok’s slick finish.
The Bruins survived the final minutes of regulation. The lapses continued with Pastrnak’s tripping infraction early in overtime.
Boston’s shorthanded unit killed off Utah’s fourth and final power play attempt of the night. Yet, they couldn’t get that elusive clear in the final seconds of Pastrnak’s minor.
Pastrnak never had a chance to re-enter the defensive end as Kesselring put the finishing touches a mere three seconds after the Boston winger had exited the penalty box.
Nearly two weeks into the season, Boston’s fourth line of Koepke, Johnny Beecher and Marc Kastelic exceeded expectations.
In a way, it’s an encouraging development that they’re all performing at a rate worthy of a top-six role. Yet, that also presents an early challenge for Montgomery and the coaching staff.
Through six games, the fourth line produced a third of Boston’s goal output, accounting for seven of the team’s 21 tallies. For the tone-setting energy Koepke, Beecher and Kastelic developed nightly, the Bruins haven’t seen any consistency out of the other three forward groups.
“They are keeping it simple. They’re winning battles. They’re connected,” Montgomery said of the B’s fourth line to Brickley. “Their triangles in the D-zone and especially the offensive zone have been really good, and the other lines have to try to emulate that if they want to have that type of success.”
Frankly, the Bruins knew heading into the year that their middle six would remain a work in progress, given their shortened wing depth. In an ideal world, they’d have Tyler Johnson under contract to provide some needed versatility. Or they’d have a more polished version of Fabian Lysell or Georgii Merkulov taking the place of Justin Brazeau, Max Jones and Riley Tufte. Instead, for the time being, they’re left with limited cap space and thin in-house options to fulfill those second and third-line needs.
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