Hoping to avoid plunge

December 19, 2007|On hockey, Kevin Paul Dupont, Globe Staff

It was right around this time last season when the Bruins, feeling generally OK about the way things shaped up through the Christmas break, soon found themselves in a dizzying tailspin that sent them teetering, then tottering, and eventually plotzing right out of the playoff picture.

Well, if you've just joined the party, it looks like it's happening again - Groundhog Day, of the Black-and-Gold genus, 2007-08.

Last night's 3-2 loss to the mighty Senators, strictly from a scoreboard standpoint, wasn't all that bad. Losing by a goal to one of the top two or three teams in the Original 30 is respectable. However, despite the math, the Bruins looked worse than that one-goal differential, and it continued a streak of Causeway Street stinkeroos that began with a 3-1 loss to the Devils Thursday and included Saturday night's humdrum 2-0 win over the Blue Jackets.

The postgame reality check belonged to one Claude Julien, this year's coach (also the third in three years), who had the intelligence, sense, immediacy, and fortitude to note the slip in quality control.

As the night wore on, noted Julien, his team became "sloppy" and "lost focus." He felt his team didn't have the "attitude" necessary to win.

"We are slipping a little bit," said Julien. "We have to get them on track. It's the truth. It's the facts, and we don't hide behind those things."

Even more to the point, Julien, when talking about his squad's failed power play (0 for 4), admitted, "Our best players have to be our best players, and clearly tonight, they weren't - and that took away our chance of winning."

In Julien's world, there is no candy-coating the rotten apple. And again, that's a very good thing.

Let us not forget that the Dave Lewis Bruins entered the Christmas break last year with an 18-13-0-2 record. As of this morning, Julien's Bruins are an eerily similar 18-12-2-1, and are now 1-2-0 in a homestand that will bring the Penguins here tomorrow night, followed by the Blues for a Saturday matinee.

If this were Oz, someone would be telling Auntie Em the silo just collapsed, the pigs hightailed down the road, and sonofagun, the barn roof with the spoked-B logo just flew over the lower forty.

Remember, it was right out of the Christmas break last season when 2006-07 miserably dissolved, and at warp speed. After an overtime loss in Chicago and then a win in Columbus, the Bruins went into Nashville Dec. 30 and got shellacked, 5-0.