ORONTO - So, is it officially a crisis yet? Is full-scale panic in order? It certainly has been a nightmare season for the Bruins and it's only 15 games into it.
The Bruins are an abysmal sight to behold, their play in the defensive zone shocking, their goaltending painfully out of their league, their forwards trying to dig out of hole after canyon-sized hole.
After last night's crushing 7-1 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs at the Air Canada Centre, Boston is 5-8-1-1 and heading for the Eastern Conference cellar, where they've now surrendered more goals than any other team in the entire NHL. They've given up 15 in the last two nights.
Think former coach Pat Burns knew a whole lot more than anyone in the front office gave him credit for? It sure looks that way. But now it's Mike Keenan's problem.
''We expect our hockey club to play with a lot more discipline than they have, with a lot more commitment than they have, with a lot more determination, and to play harder for each other, which we haven't seen yet,'' said Keenan.
He rejected the notion that the club's fortunes were a matter of waiting until its injured players come back.
''These people are responsible to each other to be prepared to play,'' he said. ''If we wait until John Grahame comes back, which is the end of February, it'll probably be a little too late.''
For a period, it looked as if the Bruins might actually be able to play with the Leafs, who were chastised by coach Pat Quinn after taking only 16 shots to 36 by the Blues in a scoreless tie Saturday.
The Leafs came out firing, all right, and a little more than seven minutes into the game had a 13-4 shot advantage and a 1-0 lead.
Forward Gary Roberts provided it when he took advantage of Jason Allison's unfortunate loss of footing. Allison fell behind the Boston net and Roberts grabbed the puck and scored on a wraparound at the right post, beating goalie Andrew Raycroft at 6:33.
Raycroft made some stellar saves in the period, particularly on left wing Sergei Berezin, who was buzzing the net the entire game.
''I thought we had a pretty good game going,'' said Keenan. ''Raycroft started the game very strongly. We responded from there. We took a couple of undisciplined penalties that cost us the hockey game.''
Mikko Eloranta pulled Boston even on his fourth goal of the season at 10:56. The Bruins picked up some steam as a result of that tally but couldn't get anything else past Curtis Joseph. The Maple Leafs came out flying in the second period, taking advantage of Boston's penalty trouble, and torched the Bruins for four goals, three in a span of 3 minutes 47 seconds, to take a 5-1 lead.
The first one of the barrage came at 7:28 when defenseman Danny Markov potted his first of the season. The Bruins gave Toronto a two-man advantage for 1:06 beginning at 14:14 of the period and the Leafs cashed in. Defenseman Hal Gill was whistled off first for interference at 13:20 and center Joe Thornton followed for high sticking. Keenan took a timeout to settle the troops and sent Allison, Darren Van Impe, and Jarno Kultanen out to kill off the threat - but it didn't work. At 14:37, Berezin beat Raycroft for the 3-1 lead.
Their fortunes got worse at 16:49 when agitator Tie Domi scored his second of the season. Right wing Jonas Hoglund, in the far right circle, dished a pass down the slot for Domi, who one-timed it through Raycroft's legs.
At 18:24, Toronto made it 5-1, officially making it a rout. Right wing Garry Valk clanged a shot off the right post and center Yanic Perreault, who was knocked down but not out by Bruins defenseman Peter Popovic, popped up and banged in the rebound.
Goalie Kay Whitmore came on in relief of Raycroft to start the third period.
Later in the period, Hoglund made it 6-1 when he banged in his own rebound as the teams skated four a side. Valk beat Whitmore with a backhander from the slot to close out the scoring.
''It's certainly embarrassing, and collectively, we should feel that way,'' said veteran defenseman Don Sweeney. ''You work harder in situations like this. We have to get back to playing together.''
