By: Tom Calautti | @TCalauttis
The Boston Bruins might be in trouble. The team is currently on a six-game losing streak and in the midst of a difficult road trip through Western Canada. There are plenty of issues plaguing the Black and Gold, but one major problem they can’t seem to solve is penalties.
The Bruins haven’t won a game since December 16th, when an injured and undermanned Utah Mammoth squad came to TD Garden. That contest marked the start of a five-game homestand, which gave Boston a golden opportunity to solidify itself in the Eastern Conference playoff race. Instead of rising to the occasion, they’ve sunken all the way to the bottom of the East.
To be fair, discipline isn’t the only issue ailing the Bruins. Their top scorers have gone cold, their defensive structure has started to leak, and their secondary scoring is beginning to dry up. Those concerns are all valid, but the sheer volume of penalties is becoming a MAJOR problem.
The Bruins lead the NHL with 532 PIMS across 40 games. That’s 23 more than any other team in the league. Over the team’s last six losses, they’ve amassed 26 penalties (not including matching minors, misconduct, or fighting majors). That means the team is averaging just over four penalties per game.
“I think a lot of games this year have been penalty trouble, and I think that’s got to stop,” said Viktor Arvidsson after last week’s loss to Montreal. “We’ve gotta look ourselves in the mirror and be better at that and stay out of the box. We’re not gonna go anywhere if we keep taking that many penalties every game.”
Arvidsson made sure to categorize the specific type of infractions his team has been committing, saying, “I think we’re taking too many, you could say, stupid (penalties).”
Stupid is the best way to describe the kind of infractions Boston regularly commits. According to Ty Anderson of 98.5 The Sports Hub, of the 26 penalties mentioned above, seven have been for tripping, five for hooking, five for high-sticking, and three for slashing.
Twenty of the team’s 26 penalties over their last six games have been stick infractions. These kinds of unnecessary and downright careless penalties are momentum killers that can shift the course of an entire game.
The worst example of Boston’s penchant for the penalty box came during the aforementioned December 23rd loss to the Montreal Canadiens. The game was knotted at two before the Habs lit the lamp to give themselves a one-goal lead.
Head coach Marco Sturm challenged the goaltender interference call, but it was upheld, resulting in a two-minute bench minor. Boston would proceed to take two more penalties in under two minutes, giving Montreal consecutive five-on-three power plays.
A promising and spirited game against their arch-rival turned into a laugher, all because the Bruins failed to stay out of the box. That game perfectly illustrated just how much of an issue Boston’s penalty problem is.
“It’s definitely something we’ve talked about trying to clean up,” said Alex Steeves following the team’s loss to Montreal. “(Penalties) seem to keep finding new ways, or the same ways, to happen. I think we’re the most penalized team in the league, so we’ve gotta clean that up.”
It isn’t just the number of penalties that are hampering the Bruins, it’s who’s committing them. In the last six games both Hampus Lindholm and Mark Kastelic have spent at least six minutes in the box. When two of your top shorthanded skaters aren’t available, it taxes the rest of your roster and forces you to either overwork your established players (Nikita Zadorov and Charlie McAvoy) or lean on guys you wouldn’t necessarily want in that situation (Mason Lohrei and Andrew Peeke).
Their increased penchant for penalties, as well as the team’s frequency of minor infractions, has lead to the penalty kill dipping below 80 percent on the season (79.6). Over the course of the team’s six-game losing streak Boston has allowed a total of seven power-play goals. Only in the loss to the Buffalo Sabres was Boston’s kill able to pitch a clean game.
The most recent instance of penalties costing a game came in Monday night’s loss to the lowly Calgary Flames. The Bruins were about to take the game to overtime when Jonathan Aspirot got whistled for a high stick at the 20:00 mark of the third period.
The Flames would head to the power play and score the game-winner 1:53 into the extra frame. Those are the type of back-breaking stick infractions that have cost the Bruins time and time again over the course of this season.
“I think we’ve addressed it many, many times before,” said Sturm after the loss to Montreal. “At some point, I think it’s, again, it’s up to the players to remove it. You have to be careful. You’ve got to know when to use your stick and maybe not.”
At the end of the day, this team isn’t deep enough on the offensive or defensive sides to make up for the amount of time they’re spending shorthanded. They don’t have the personnel to outscore these mistakes, and they don’t have the defensive corps to continue killing off these penalties.
Sturm said the quiet part out loud following the loss to the Habs, and Bruins fans have to hope his words aren’t a harbinger for the rest of the season.
“I think everyone has to ask themselves, ‘do we really have to take that penalty?’ Those are big deals because the cost us games, points. Those kind of points we need at the end of the year, so it definitely has to be better.”
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