The Patrice Bergeron line had just worked wizardry in the offensive zone, leading to David Pastrnak all alone inside the right faceoff circle staring at a wide open Islanders net.
It was the type of open net hockey players dream of. It was an easy opportunity to give the Bruins a 1-0 lead late in the first period of Game 4, a contest where the Bruins were looking to take a stranglehold of the series and with it, a 3-1 series lead
Instead, the puck caught iron, bounced back off the skate of Semyon Varlamov and just sat there for Varlamov to cover up.
The Islanders would go on to win Game 4 4-1, knotting the series up at two games apiece.
“That’s when you know it might be a tough night for us in terms of getting things to go our way, when your best player hits the post on an open net, and it just kind of sits there,” Bruins head coach Bruce Cassidy said. “It’s going to be one of those nights where you’re probably not going to get the breaks so you have to go earn them yourself.”
In a series that has been as tight as this one has, every missed opportunity is magnified, the Bruins had plenty of them Saturday night.
In the second, the Bruins finally got themselves on the board as David Krejci’s power play tally gave the Bruins the 1-0 lead. After a coaches challenge by Barry Trotz failed to overturn the goal, the Bruins immediately went back to the power play.
A two-goal lead would have felt like a four-goal lead given the landscape of this series. But yet again, it was another missed opportunity. A power play effort that failed to land a single shot on Varlamov.
40 seconds after the power play expired, Mathew Barzal tied the game at one.
“I think the second (power play) unit, I was disappointed. They don’t get a lot of time, obviously, behind the first unit, but it was an opportunity for them to step up,” said Cassidy.
"No one wanted to shoot the puck. They still practice a lot, and we have certain people we want to run it through, but every one of them refused to shoot the puck. We had it in the slot, turned down a shot. The elbow, up top. It just kills your momentum.”
As poor of a performance as the Bruins saw from their second power play unit in Game 4, Cassidy still would have liked more opportunities on the power play. Cassidy feels the Bruins haven’t gotten enough in the playoffs.
“I think the whole playoffs we haven’t gotten very many calls to put us on the power play. I think we certainly had enough that we’ve taken. Some of them have been lack of discipline. Some of them were the too many men in the ice [that] they have to call, couple over the glass,” said Cassidy.
“But I certainly think the infractions (by other teams against the Bruins), we haven’t had calls go our way; the borderline ones you look at, even some non-borderline.”
What Cassidy is likely referring to were Brock Nelson’s hit on Charlie McAvoy that could have been boarding, a missed high stick that struck the face of Jeremy Lauzon and the fact that Barzal did not get called for cross checking after sending four strikes to the back of Krejci.
Krejci got two minutes when he retaliated with a slash to Barzal’s midsection.
“Obviously, I wasn’t too happy about it,” Krejci said. “He went down pretty easily. It is what it is.”
Although Krejci scored the Bruins lone goal in Game 4, at five-on-five, the Bruins second line was non-existent as the trio combined for just three shots five-on-five.
“The lack of urgency to get a puck to the net. I think it was a bit of a formula tonight in general,” said Cassidy. "We weren't willing to shoot enough, at least to get to their goaltender. We paid the price for it. We didn't score five-on-five. Just turned down way too many shots."
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