Four areas Bruins must improve entering pivotal Game 3 vs. Maple Leafs originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston
BOSTON — For the second straight year, the Bruins followed a Game 1 win in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs with a lackluster performance in a Game 2 loss.
The Toronto Maple Leafs were the more desperate team Monday night at TD Garden and earned a well-deserved 3-2 victory. The series is now tied at one win apiece as the action shifts to Toronto for Game 3 on Wednesday night.
The Bruins had a chance to win Game 2 thanks to a stellar effort in net by Linus Ullmark, who made 30 saves in his first action of the series. The Bruins also scored another power-play goal. But they also made way too many mistakes, and a good team like the Leafs is going to make you pay more often than not.
“I don’t think we’ve played anywhere near as good as we can,” Bruins forward David Pastrnak said following Game 2.
How can the Bruins find their best game for 60 minutes in Toronto later this week? Here are four key areas where improvement is needed.
5-on-5 scoring production
The Bruins have scored seven goals in this series, including Trent Frederic‘s empty-net tally at the end of Game 1. Almost half of those goals — three, to be exact — have come on the power play. While the power play’s resurgence — two goals in Game 1 and another in Game 2 — is definitely an encouraging sign for the Bruins, the lack of 5-on-5 production is a problem.
Jake DeBrusk, Pavel Zacha, Brad Marchand and Charlie Coyle have zero 5-on-5 goals through two games. Only four Bruins players have more than two 5-on-5 shots in two games, and one of them is defenseman Brandon Carlo.
The Bruins scored just one 5-on-5 goal Monday. It came near the end of the first period when Zacha made a brilliant no-look pass to set up a David Pastrnak one-timer. Boston wasn’t able to generate much at 5-on-5 the rest of the game. The B’s tallied just two shots and two scoring chances during 14:29 of 5-on-5 action in the third period. That’s nowhere near good enough, especially when they were trailing with 7:54 remaining after Auston Matthews‘ go-ahead goal.
The Bruins, based on the amount and quality of their scoring chances in Game 2, were expected to score only 1.86 5-on-5 goals, per Natural Stat Trick.
Why aren’t the Bruins generating enough quality scoring chances?
“I think it’s a function of their defending well,” Montgomery said postgame. “It’s also a function of we’re not playing fast enough….