Post by Bruins GM on Sept 12, 2011 15:09:40 GMT -5
The Boston Bruins were one of the hottest teams going into the first round of the playoffs. Sadly, all that momentum resulted in a whole lot of nothing.
While the Bruins managed to hold the high powered Senators offence to just slightly over 3 goals a game and managed to keep Sidney Crosby (1 g, 2 a) and Jeff Carter (1 g, 2 a) from really lighting the lamp, it was a glaring lack of scoring that ultimately did the Bruins in. All but one of the games was decided by a single goal. Two games went to overtime. In the end, the Sens' Steve Downie and Steve Ott who proved to be the thorn in the Bruins' collective side. Both players more noted for the grit and tenacity finished the series with 4 pts apiece and 5 (3 and 2 repsectively) of Ottawa's 13 goals in the series.
The Bruins meanwhile had several players who could not find the back of the net. Jamie Langenbrunner who was on a tear leading up to the playoffs was goaless and Daniel Alfredsson (recently returned from injury) was woeful (1 g , 1 a) in his three games. Only Mike Knuble (2 g, 1 a, 13 hits) seemed to have a pulse. Tomas Vokoun could not hold everything back like he seemed to do down the stretch.
GM Chris Keogh feels that his team had the tools to be more competitive than they showed. When asked if the Bruins missed Nicklas Backstrom's offense, he said, "Sure. He's a world class player but he was not having his best season with us for some reason so he could have easily been a non-factor like many of the other players we still have. I mean, the guys really stepped up in Backstom's absence and pushed hard to get us into the 5th seed on our conference. We felt like we made a sound decision moving Nick when we did knowing the future looks a lot better for us almost immediately." Backstrom was traded at the deadline for young prospects Jordan Eberle, Linus Omark, Chris Butler and Montreal's 1st round pick.
The end result was another bitterly disappointing (but perhaps not completely unexpected) first round departure.
While the Bruins managed to hold the high powered Senators offence to just slightly over 3 goals a game and managed to keep Sidney Crosby (1 g, 2 a) and Jeff Carter (1 g, 2 a) from really lighting the lamp, it was a glaring lack of scoring that ultimately did the Bruins in. All but one of the games was decided by a single goal. Two games went to overtime. In the end, the Sens' Steve Downie and Steve Ott who proved to be the thorn in the Bruins' collective side. Both players more noted for the grit and tenacity finished the series with 4 pts apiece and 5 (3 and 2 repsectively) of Ottawa's 13 goals in the series.
The Bruins meanwhile had several players who could not find the back of the net. Jamie Langenbrunner who was on a tear leading up to the playoffs was goaless and Daniel Alfredsson (recently returned from injury) was woeful (1 g , 1 a) in his three games. Only Mike Knuble (2 g, 1 a, 13 hits) seemed to have a pulse. Tomas Vokoun could not hold everything back like he seemed to do down the stretch.
GM Chris Keogh feels that his team had the tools to be more competitive than they showed. When asked if the Bruins missed Nicklas Backstrom's offense, he said, "Sure. He's a world class player but he was not having his best season with us for some reason so he could have easily been a non-factor like many of the other players we still have. I mean, the guys really stepped up in Backstom's absence and pushed hard to get us into the 5th seed on our conference. We felt like we made a sound decision moving Nick when we did knowing the future looks a lot better for us almost immediately." Backstrom was traded at the deadline for young prospects Jordan Eberle, Linus Omark, Chris Butler and Montreal's 1st round pick.
The end result was another bitterly disappointing (but perhaps not completely unexpected) first round departure.