Bruins missing opportunities — and Kessel
It's clear Boston hasn't replaced production it lost in trading young forward
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DETROIT - On the night Phil Kessel made his much-anticipated debut with the Toronto Maple Leafs, his former team was shut out. Again. The Boston Bruins lost 2-0 to the Detroit Red Wings on Tuesday, and have now gone nearly 134 minutes without scoring.
They're playing well enough to win, but they're not winning. They're creating enough opportunities to score, but they're not scoring.
The Bruins are showing signs of emerging from an uninspiring start, just not enough to consistently win games. And the missed points are starting to pile up.
"If we keep getting content with that we're not going to be very successful," a frustrated Claude Julien said after Tuesday's loss. "Somehow you're going to have to make it happen if you're going to turn this thing around."
Nobody in Boston wants to hear this, but these Bruins sure could use Kessel. Somebody in the Bruins dressing room mentioned Kessel's stats from the Toronto game and it was met with an ugly look from one of the Boston players. The look was clear. Kessel is gone; nobody here wants to know how he's helping another team.
Julien said as much on Monday, even before his team turned in another zero.
"We made a deal and we've moved on," Julien said. "We've got guys who have moved in and done a pretty good job with (replacing Kessel). It is what it is. Phil Kessel has moved on and we've moved on."
If only the part about replacing Kessel were true. It's not easy to replace 36 goals. The hope was that a healthy Marco Sturm would help.
"We replaced one (30-goal scorer) with another," Mark Recchi said.
Sturm has two goals. Another potential 30-goal scorer, Michael Ryder, has three. David Krejci has one. Recchi has two.
Not the goal totals of players jumping in to pick up scoring production that left with Kessel.
"When you replace people, it takes a little time," Recchi said. "We've got guys who can do what he was doing. Right now, it's just not happening. Eventually it will."
It'd better hurry.
Last season, the Bruins' power play (23.6 percent) was the fourth-best in the league, trailing only San Jose, Washington and Detroit.
On Tuesday night, the Bruins' power play had two shots in three opportunities. For the season, Boston's power play is at 11.5 percent, a total at the bottom of the NHL.
"When you're not scoring goals, you're not scoring goals," Julien said. "Right now, our top end is having a tough time scoring goals."
Marc Savard, the Bruins' third-leading goal scorer on the power play last season, is out with a broken foot. Their fourth-leading goal scorer on the power play last season, Kessel, plays in Toronto.
Their leading power-play scorer from last year? It's Zdeno Chara and he's now seeing time on the second unit. Why?
"No idea," Chara told SN. "You have to talk to coach."
Coach?
"We're just moving it around, gave our power play different looks," Julien said. "That's all."
GM Peter Chiarelli had his eye on the big picture when he received two first-round picks from Leafs GM Brian Burke for Kessel. Someday, if OHL prospect Taylor Hall is skating around for the Bruins because of the trade, a scoring slump in November will be long forgotten.
But right now it hurts. That scoring depth up front that helped the Bruins emerge as one of last season's surprise teams in the East is gone. And the Bruins aren't winning without it.
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