The Bruins have already taken their share of ugly losses through the first month and change of the 2024-25 season.
But Saturday at TD Garden felt especially ugly for the Bruins, who lacked any sort of pop and collapsed their way into a 3-2 overtime loss to the Blues.
“I don’t know, we just didn’t have a lot of juice in the tank,” Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery said after the loss. “I don’t know why we didn’t. We stayed over in Dallas [on Thursday] to have the proper sleep to enable us for today. We had legs in the first, but kind of fell off after that.”
For Boston, this was their second time suffering a loss when leading after two periods, which dropped the club down to 4-0-2 on the year when leading after 40.
Third Star: Joonas Korpisalo
DENVER, COLORADO – OCTOBER 16: Joonas Korpisalo #70 of the Boston Bruins tends goal against the Colorado Avalanche in the second period at Ball Arena on October 16, 2024 in Denver, Colorado. (Matthew Stockman/Getty Images)
If you were box-score watching and nothing more, a 28-of-31 line in the Boston net from Joonas Korpisalo is nothing overly impressive, you’d say. But when you saw just how poor of an effort the Bruins had in front of Korpisalo — from defensive-zone turnovers to the lack of any sort of push on the Blues’ Jordan Binnington — Korpisalo downright earned the Bruins their ‘loser point’ in this contest.
The undeniable No. 2 behind Jeremy Swayman, starts are naturally going to be hard to come by for the Finnish-born Korpisalo. But with the Bruins in need of a spark, and with Korpisalo’s game seemingly getting better as he gets more comfortable in his skin with the Bruins, there should be a legitimate conversation within the Bruins’ walls about giving him some more run here.
Second Star: Trent Frederic
Nov 16, 2024; Boston, Massachusetts, USA; Boston Bruins center Trent Frederic (11) is congratulated by center Charlie Coyle (13) after scoring his second goal against the St. Louis Blues during the first period at TD Garden. (Winslow Townson-Imagn Images)
Point blank: Trent Frederic has not been good enough for the B’s this season.
Perhaps some of this is natural regression naturally coming for Frederic after he shot almost 15 percent in back-to-back seasons, sure, but when it came to impacting the game beyond the score sheet, Frederic was not doing enough. And if there’s minimal impact both on and off the score sheet, that’s a gigantic problem for the Black and Gold and one that these Bruins more than likely aren’t built to withstand in 2024-25.
Fortunately for the Bruins, these last two games have shown signs of a turnaround there, with Frederic on the board with an assist in Thursday’s loss to the Stars and two goals in a losing effort against the Blues on Saturday.
The goals were Frederic’s first tallies since an Opening Night goal down in Sunrise.
First Star: Brayden Schenn
Nov 16, 2024; Boston, Massachusetts, USA; St. Louis Blues center Brayden Schenn (10) lets go with the game winning shot in overtime to give the Blues a 3-2 win over the Boston Bruins at TD Garden. (Winslow Townson/Imagn Images)
Let’s be real here, Brayden Schenn probably should’ve had two or three goals in regulation alone. He was all over the ice and was a constant impact presence for the Blues. And though they didn’t come in the opening 60 minutes of this contest, the Blues won’t complain about Schenn’s apparent flair for the dramatic, with the Blues captain on the board with the game-winning goal in the extra session.
In addition to the goal, Schenn finished this game with two hits, two blocks, and wins in 11 of his 19 faceoffs.
