By: Tom Calautti | Follow me on Twitter @TCalauttis
Sometimes you just run into a hot goalie, and sometimes you’re the better team but just can’t pull off a win. That happened last night as the Boston Bruins fell to the New York Islanders 2-1. Despite dominating most of the play, and getting the better of the chances through three periods, the Black and gold saw another two points slip through their fingers.
Just like Tuesday’s loss to Toronto, the Bruins came out of the gate strong, outshooting the Islanders 15-6 in the first period. However, it wasn’t just shots on net that illustrated Boston’s dominance. They out-attempted the Isles 31-18, out-chanced them 18-6, and high-danger scoring chances were 8-3. Unfortunately for them, Ilya Sorokin was in net for New York and was up to the task all night.
“He was the difference in the game,” said Head Coach Joe Sacco following the loss. “I often look at the number of chances we generated, but it seemed like it was enough (to score more). He was really good tonight.”
Sorokin finished the evening stopping 38 of 39 shots on goal and making timely saves both early and late in the game to keep the contest tied and hold on to the one-goal lead.
“That’s the last thing we needed, to come and have (Sorokin) play like he did tonight,” said David Pastrnak who scored the lone goal (his 31st of the season) and notched the 800th point of his career. “We maybe needed to (score one) earlier and maybe it’s a different game, but yeah, tough time.”
The real story of the night came during Brad Marchand’s postgame media scrum. Boston’s captain was asked about how he’s dealing with the team’s lack of success this season and dropped an interesting tidbit about his plans for this season and beyond.
While talking about how the team needs to overcome adversity as a group and reflecting on how these challenging times only serve to bring teams closer together, Marchand commented on what it will take for Boston to right the ship.
“Obviously it hasn’t been the season that we wanted and we haven’t had the success that we would’ve liked this time of year. But the good thing is that we’re coming together, and at the end of the day we may not achieve what we hoped to this year but that doesn’t mean that we can’t build for something greater and bring it back next year.”
Despite rampant speculation and the swirling rumor mill, the Bruins’ captain seems to want to stay in Boston and hopes to be part of the retooling for the future. If Don Sweeney and management leave the possibility of a trade in Marchand’s hands, he seems all-in on remaining a part of this organization.
The Bruins missed two critical points last night and are four out of the final two wild card spots, with a game in hand on the seventh and eighth seeds. They’ll travel to Pittsburgh to take on the Penguins in a matinee on Saturday.
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