Bruins offense falls flat in shutout loss to Wild
The Boston Bruins fell to the Minnesota Wild on Sunday afternoon at Xcel Energy Center in a 1-0 loss.
The first didn’t feature a whole lot of action. But Mark Kastelic tried to change that when he dropped the gloves with Marcus Foligno with 10:22 left in the period with a heavyweight tilt.
Foligno brought Kastelic to the ground after the two exchanged blows, but it didn’t generate much offense on either side as both teams went into the intermission scoreless.
The stalemate ended 5:01 in the second when Frederick Gaudreau got a piece of a Marcus Johansson shot through traffic to beat Jeremy Swayman for the 1-0 lead on a play where the officials missed a slash on Morgan Geekie.
The score remained 1-0 thanks in part to Swayman who came up with some big saves throughout the period.
The Bruins had their chances in the third period, including a power play. But the offense was lifeless and couldn’t capitalize despite outshooting the Wild, 28-22.
Filip Gustavsson stopped all 28 shots he faced
Swayman — who has now lost his last five starts — made 21 saves in the loss.
The Bruins return home Tuesday night when they host the Nashville Predators.
Secondary scoring remains issue for Bruins after shutout loss
The Minnesota Wild only needed one goal to beat the Boston Bruins on Sunday, but it didn’t come without some controversy.
Morgan Geekie’s stick was slashed out of his hand on the play by Jared Spurgeon — something the officials didn’t call. Marcus Johansson sent the puck threw traffic before Frederick Gaudreau got a piece of en route to Minnesota’s 1-0 win.
“He got his stick whacked out of his hand,” Bruins coach Joe Sacco told reporters after the game. “And if he has his stick he’s able to take that passing lane away up the middle of the ice. There’s no question.”
The sequence was a tough one for Geekie, who gave away an icing after he stopped skating toward the puck. He also looked toward the official when his stick was knocked out of his hands looking for the call.
Regardless of the missed call, Sacco isn’t putting the loss on that one play when the offense didn’t generate any goals in three periods of play.
“We have to find a way to put one in the back of the net, get it behind the goaltender,” Sacco said. “We weren’t able to do that…. We have to find a way to put the puck in, whether it’s creating more traffic at the net, having more of a shot mindset, playing off the shot more, crating some more 2-on-1’s.”