This story should have been an easy one to write. In fact, it was all planned out ahead of time. The Bruins, seething from the devastating blind side hit from Matt Cooke that effectively ended Marc Savard’s season, motivated by a sell-out crowd and the presence of the 1970 Big Bad Bruins, and enraged at the inaction of Colin Campbell, came out motivated and pounded the Pittsburgh Penguins into submission.
It was to be the signature game of an otherwise disappointing season. The proverbial cherry on top of the ice cream sundae that painfully and publicly turned from sweet to sour. Instead, it was a 3-0 loss characterized less by the two poundings delivered by Bruins fisticuffs than the glaring deficiencies that have plagued the Black and Gold all season.
1:58 into the first period, Shaun Thornton coaxed Cooke to left of the Penguins goal crease and did what he was supposed to, although not as convincingly as the Bruins faithful may have wanted. Seconds later, Milan Lucic pounded Sergei Gonchar into the boards. Zdeno Chara wringed a roaring slap shot off the post. The crowd roared, the Pens seemed to be on their heels, and the Bruins smelled blood. But, less than two minutes later, at 8:34, Tyler Kennedy slipped a wrist shot past Tuuka Rask on a two-on-one that resulted from an overaggressive Milan Lucic. The air left the building. The spark was gone. Throughout the rest of the period, the Bruins missed out on several scoring opportunities and entered the break down 1-0. The second period began, and it was as if the Matt Cooke incident never happened. The Bruins played like they have all season: sloppy, slow, and disjointed. They lost battles for the puck in the neutral zone, failed to connect on passes into the offensive zone, and took bad penalties. Zdeno Chara tried to provide a spark at 11:43 when he threw down the gloves with Mike Rupp. But much like the Bruins’ 2009-2010 performance, it didn’t work. Six minutes later, Steve Begin (the worst signing of Peter Chiarelli’s tenure) took an ill-advised tripping penalty and the Pens took advantage, scoring on a redirect from Alexie Ponikarovsky to take a 2-0 lead.
To start the third, the 17,565-plus began bellowing “We Want Cooke”. Bruins announcer Jack Edwards quipped that Bruins wanted some better scoring chances. They would, however, get neither the blood revenge they demanded, nor the miraculous transformation they all secretly knew they would never have. Mike Rupp scored at 5:14 of the third, and the dagger was twisted and left in to fester. The only remaining question was, with the game clearly out of hand, would the Bruins at least show some level of frustration or heart? The timing seemed perfect. A season down the drain, a hated opponent, and a blood thirsty crowd. But, as a seemingly fitting eulogy to the season, the Bruins came up empty.
With 11:40 left in the third, the Bruins managed their first shot of the period and the crowd gave a sarcastic cheer. As the clock wore down, boos began to rain down from the rafters. They were well deserved, because much like the Bruins season, expectations were not met, and a city hungry for some semblance of a hockey winner was left unfulfilled.
