The Bruins had been completely positioned to reap the benefits of an advantageous matchup towards a subpar Sabres group, however that didn’t show to be sufficient for Boston to increase its successful streak to 4 on Thursday night time.
In squandering an opportunity at constructing on their latest momentum, the Bruins had been handed a 3-1 loss from the Sabres at TD Backyard, dropping Boston to 2-4-1 when trailing after the primary two durations.
There was a transparent distinction in urgency and depth which allowed Buffalo to place Boston to play catch-up, making a deficit the Bruins weren’t capable of dig themselves out of — even after Brad Marchand sliced the result in 2-1 within the second interval.
“I assumed they had been hungrier than us,” Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery mentioned, as seen on NESN’s postgame protection. “It got here down as that straightforward. I assumed that Buffalo was successful the 50-50 battles, they had been killing us on the attracts and also you’re chasing a recreation.”
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Montgomery added: “We undoubtedly didn’t have the power or the juice we often have.”
Boston nonetheless skated away with an Atlantic Division-best 17-5-3 file, however when contemplating the Sabres are in rivalry for the worst file within the Japanese Convention, it places the loss in a extra daunting perspective. The Bruins had probabilities to muster up a rally, however didn’t and Buffalo took benefit of that, giving the B’s certainly one of their greatest head-scratching losses to this point.
“I felt we weren’t keen to work for our offense,” Montgomery defined. “We weren’t keen to place it in and go to work. It takes a variety of work to be an excellent forechecking group and tonight we simply didn’t have that.”
That’ll guide Boston for the loss column any given night time, no matter who they face on the ice.
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Listed here are extra notes from Thursday night time’s Bruins-Sabres recreation:
— The Bruins entered the night time having already compiled a good 10-0-1 file of their earlier 11 video games with the Sabres.
— Linus Ullmark suffered his first profession loss to the Sabres in 5 matchups, though the save share stays sturdy at 94.5%. Buffalo netted a dagger aim proper previous Ullmark within the third interval and utilized stress all three durations, firing off 36 photographs on aim.
“It wasn’t that dangerous, I believe,” Ullmark informed reporters postgame, per NESN. “They wanna create a variety of chaos, clearly and so they wanna put a variety of our bodies in entrance (of the web). However I believe we did an excellent job of coming again and begin checking out higher and higher as the sport went on.”
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— Charlie McAvoy made an early departure within the third interval after colliding with Buffalo’s JJ Peterka, and didn’t return.
— Marchand, who prevented the Bruins from getting shut out by the Sabres together with his twelfth aim of the season, is now accountable for scoring every of Boston’s final 5 targets.
— Subsequent, in quest of a bounce-back victory, the Bruins will host the Arizona Coyotes on Saturday afternoon. Puck drop from TD Backyard is scheduled for 1 p.m. ET, and you’ll catch the sport, plus an hour of pregame protection, reside on NESN.
