BUFFALOIn the greatest piece of evidence yet that the Bruins are experiencing some serious issues, the Black and Gold skaters marched into Buffalo and suffered their worst beating of the season at the hands of the Sabres.
The Bruins were robbed of a Milan Lucic goal on a poor goalie interference call in the first period, but didnt respond at all to an aggressive, desperate Sabres bunch in a 6-0 loss at the First Niagara Center.
If the Sabres didnt get their revenge on the Bs the first time they played after the LucicRyan Miller incident, they certainly got it this time around.
For the Bruins, it marked the 11th time in their 17 losses this season that they dropped a game to a team down and out of the playoff race. That screams out focus problems against the bad teams for a Stanley Cup-level squad like the Bruins, and that was again in Buffalo.
There was serious trouble brewing when the Bs defense was burned for a couple of goals to Christian Ehrhoff and Jason Pominville in the first period, and then Tuukka Rask was yanked in the second period on a Tyler Ennis score. Milan Lucic dropped the gloves with Patrick Kaleta and Shawn Thornton fought twice attempting to keep the Bruins emotionally invested into a contest slipping away from them.
But it was all for naught by the time the villainous Patrick Kaleta beat Tim Thomas with a five-hole goal to spot the Sabres a four-goal lead heading into the third period. All that was left was for Kaleta to act up in the final minutes of the third period and draw 10-minute misconducts from Milan Lucic and Adam McQuaid during a line brawl donnybrook in front of the Boston bench.
The Bruins are now 3-4-1 in their last eight games and havent put two solid, victorious efforts together back-to-back since prior to Christmas.