Bruins go winless on road trip behind 2-1 loss to Red Wings
In a finish that’s becoming headlined by new lows, for the first the first time in over 60 years, the Bruins will return to Boston with zero wins on a road trip of at least five games.
The latest setback came behind a Saturday night 2-1 loss to the Red Wings, with the Black and Gold flying back home with an 0-5-0 record on the five-game trip and outscored 23-7 over the course of that five-game trek away from TD Garden.
Put in an 0-1 hole early when Mason Lohrei had an egregious giveaway to Marco Kasper that paved the way for an ugly goal on the Bruins’ Jeremy Swayman, Detroit doubled their lead to in the opening minute of the second period behind a Lucas Raymond top-shelf bomb through Swayman.
The Bruins responded with a power-play strike of their own behind a Morgan Geekie deflection through traffic to make it a one-goal game through 40 minutes of action. But from there, the offense by all means dried up on the Bruins (and that’s putting it lightly), as the Bruins did not get on the board with a shot in the third period until a Nikita Zadorov 60-footer hit Cam Talbot with 5:54 remaining in the game.
The Bruins would pressure Talbot and the Wings over the final two minutes of the game, with their best look coming on a Casey Mittelstadt opportunity to the left of Talbot with just seconds remaining in regulation, but the Bruins could not find the equalizer before the final horn.
If there’s a positive to be found within this loss for the Bruins, it’s that Swayman rebounded from the ugly goal that kicked things off and finished with a 20-of-22 night in the Boston crease. Statistically speaking, it was Swayman’s best outing of the current losing streak, and best since a 26-of-28 performance against the Panthers back on Mar. 11. That goes beyond the raw save percentage, too, with Swayman credited with a 4-for-4 night on high-danger shots against per NaturalStatTrick.com.
And at the other end of the rink, Geekie’s tally was good for his 27th of the campaign. That tied Geekie with Michael Ryder (2008-09) for the second-most goals by any player signed as an unrestricted free agent by the Bruins since 2005. In case you’re wondering, Jarome Iginla is the leader in that category, with 30 goals during first and only season with the Black and Gold back in 2013-14.
With the loss, the Bruins pushed their losing streak to eight (0-7-1), ‘good’ for their worst eight-game segment since an 0-7-1 run back in March 1997.
Following the downright ugly road trip, it’ll indeed get worse for the B’s, as they’ll get back to work on Tuesday night when they welcome Alex Ovechkin and the East-best Capitals to Boston.
