Boston Bruins

The Bruins Are Beginning To Crack And Crumble From The Inside Out

Published

3 weeks ago

November 19, 2024

Andrew Fantucchio

AP Photo/Charles Krupa

BOSTON– The Boston Bruins have prided themselves on a culture based on accountability for nearly 20 years.

Now, 20 games into their season, that foundation has begun to crack.

The pillars of resiliency, teamwork, and effort that once held up the roof at TD Garden toppled to the ground on Monday night, leaving the Bruins lying in waste after a 5-1 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets.

There are few signs of hope among the wreckage and even less of the culture that once seemed unwavering.

The Bruins are crumbling right before your eyes.

5-1 Columbus.

— Andrew Fantucchio (@A_Fantucchio) November 19, 2024

“The fact is that our standard isn’t being met, and that’s all we need to care about,” goalie Jeremy Swayman said. “All the other noise doesn’t matter. We know how to do that as a locker room. I still believe that this culture is the best in the league. We’re not holding ourselves to the standard that we need to, so it’s my job, it’s everyone in this room’s job, to do so.”

So far through this season, which has been nothing short of dismal, the Bruins have dismissed their early struggles as a mere bump in the road.

Somehow, some way, they believe they will right the ship. They always have.

“Everyone goes through struggles, whether in life or you’re a team,” Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery said. “That’s what life’s about. How do you pick yourself up? It’s not how hard you fall. It’s how quickly you pick yourself up.”

The problem is this team isn’t capable of picking itself back up. All it can do is fall over itself time and time again.

Read More: Unbothered Bruins Unable To Do The Simple Things To Win

Watching a Bruins hockey game in the year 2024-25 is akin to watching a compilation of the worst car wrecks, where every subsequent moment is worse than the last, and Monday night was no different.

After Brandon Carlo whiffed on a shot attempt from the point on the power play, he and Mason Lohrei were too slow to get back and stop Dmitiri Voronkov on a breakaway. As they crashed into Swayman, they forced the puck into the back of the net for the first of two Columbus shorthanded goals in the game.

Dmitri Voronkov opens the scoring in Boston WHILE FALLING 🚨 pic.twitter.com/rvRyxJtmma

— NHL (@NHL) November 19, 2024

It was Boston’s third straight loss and fifth in its last seven outings. At the quarter-mark of the season, the Bruins are still yet to collect more than two wins in a row. Against teams with a sub-five hundred points percentage, they are 4-3-3.

“That’s one thing with this league, it will humble you very quick,” Brad Marchand said. “If you ever think that you’re too good for it or if you deserve to be here, you have to earn it every day. I think that’s a mindset we can all be better in.”

The most startling aspect of it all is the culture that took years to build, that had stood for nearly a generation, has crumbled as if it were built on sand all along.

The accountability and all else that the Bruins once stood for has eroded, leaving nothing behind but a team in ruins.

“It does come from the top on down,” said Marchand. “There’s a lot that happens in this room. It’s a very private group from the top down, but they’re the most accountable pieces of this puzzle. They’re the hardest-working guys in here every day. In the summer, in the winter, it doesn’t matter. You can’t point fingers up top. The accountability piece comes from them, and it’s got to bleed into the group.”

Whispers of an impending Bruins shake-up began over the weekend, and the noise only grew louder as the team was booed off the ice on Monday.

The version of the Bruins that currently–and barely–stands may soon cease to exist.

“We’ve always had a very strong group in here,” Marchand said. “You rely on each other, open up, and talk about it. We don’t hide from it. We don’t hide from the fact that it hasn’t gone our way.”

It’s not as if the Bruins have anywhere to hide.

The walls are already coming down, and it’s time for a demolition.