BOSTON BRUINS 2007 SYNOPSIS

I decided to let a week pass before discussing my beloved Bruins. For the most part the disappointment and anger has subsided and a rational summary is here.
The season started off with a pathetic loss, a clue off things to come. The club lost 8-3 to the lowly Panthers. Despite defeating the Lightning the following night, the club stumbled out to a 2-6 mark in part to poor losses to the Blues and Habs, two weak clubs that inevitably didn't qualify for the playoffs.
The club won 9 of 14 in November to climb the division standings. In December the team went 7-6 to set themselves up for a run as 2007 approached. In the final month of 2006, the club looked unstoppable in wins against future playoff club's New Jersey, Ottawa and Vancouver. But they looked awful in losses to the mediocre Maple Leafs, Columbus and Florida. It was the clear case of two teams, the Bruins were simply inconsistent.
2007 began with back-to-back losses to the pedestrian Maple Leafs, getting outscored 15-3 in the process. The team was exposed for the frauds that they so often were and the season began to falter. Just days before the Bruins sat in 3rd place out of five in the Northeast division.
By month's end, the club lost 10 of 13 to essentially fall out of the playoff race. The month ended with 4 pathetic losses: 3-0 vs. OTT, 3-1 vs. OTT, 6-1 vs. NYR and 7-1 vs. Buffalo. If you tally that up, the Bruins were outscored 19-3.
February saw the Bruins win 8 of 13. The club ran off a 4 game winning streak before faltering in the final 2 games of the month.
March approached and the club was still close to a playoff spot. Unfortunately, they had to leapfrog several teams, and most nights the teams ahead of them played one another. The additional points given for shootouts/overtime made it difficult to gain points on the clubs just ahead of them in the standings.
The club won 2 of 3 to start the month, and positioned themselves on the cusp of the 8th spot. The city was optimistic with home games vs. Colorado and Minnesota up next. It was make-or-break time for the young club. The team lost 2-0 and 2-1. The team hit rock bottom in a loss to the lowly Flyers the following match.
The final hurrah for the club featured a brilliant yet confusing victory over the mighty Wings in Detroit. They defeated the Capitals soon thereafter, then things took a despicable turn for the worse.
The Bruins got shellacked by the Rangers 7-0, vaulting the NYR into the playoffs and dashing any playoff hopes for the B's. With nothing but pride on the line, the team quit. The next game they lost 1-0 at home to the rival Habs then 2-1 in a rematch 48 hours later. But the atrocity didn't end there; the team lost to the NYR again, this time at home 2-1 then lost 5-0 vs. the Pens the following day.
More confusing and frustrating circumstances soon followed; the team went into Ottawa and won then lost the next two games to put a gruesome March behind them.
April approached and the club was now only ahead of the Caps and Flyers in the conference, a huge drop in a mere few weeks. The team lost all 4 games in the month, getting outscored 15-6, including another loss to the rival Habs 2-0 at home!
The team ended up 35-41-6, losing the last 6 games, a far cry from the 19-13 record the cub held earlier in the campaign. Overall the club finished 13th out of 15 teams. Worse of all, the club was outscored 289-219 overall. The number may be skewed a bit with the poor flops to the NYR 7-0, 6-1 to the NYR, 7-1 to Buffalo and Pitt. 5-0. Most nights the Bruins gave up empty net goals too.
So why did the team fail so badly? That is a crucial and complex question and answer. The team took way too many penalties, especially dumb ones like too many men and delay of game. The team skated poorly on most nights, thus the club ended up hooking the opposing players who skated harder and faster. The team gave up a ton of shorthanded goals too. The club gave up 18 SH goals, tops in the league by a wide margin. The club was inconsistent and undisciplined. Ironically, they were not tough or physical. Outside of late call up Jeremy Reich, the club had no enforcer. Chara had zero fights despite all the losing. Basically, the club can improve on everything. Tim Thomas did his best behind the pipes, but the Bruins played poor defense and let the opponents circle the net and obscure his view of the shots attempted.
Some good did exist. Younster Kessel played well at times, Thomas was exciting and mostly successful and Mark Savard was the MVP tallying a ton of assists and a handful of goals.
Some good wins happened versus Ottawa, Buffalo, New Jersey, Vancouver, Pittsburgh, Detroit and Calgary. But the Bruins lost bad games, including giving up late goals vs. the lowly Blues in October, the loss at home vs. Montreal via a goal with 2 seconds remaining, giving up three late goals vs. Buffalo in November before losing and letting Columbus tie the game with 23 seconds left before falling in OT. The most telling stat of all was the clubs record against conference foes Florida, Atlanta, NYI and the NYR; 1-15. The one win was a SO win, hardly an accomplishment. Kinda like the 2006-07 campaign.