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PANTHERS 6, BRUINS 3 [ Game stats ]
But last night, after the Bruins' 6-3 loss to the Florida Panthers, Burns's upset was different. During the second intermission, after his club had surrendered six goals to set a Panthers record, Burns yelled at his players. It was short, it was intense, and it was different in a very anguished way.
''He came in and addressed the embarrassment, that we completely let it go,'' said goalie Rob Tallas, who came on in relief of John Grahame when it was 5-1. ''He showed a lot of frustration and I don't blame him. We give him three periods a game to do that sometimes. He's held his cool and he's been cool about everything. It was a tough night for him. He's a proud coach.
''He takes pride in the jersey he coaches behind the bench of and it's just as frustrating for him as it was for us. He was mad. I've seen him a lot madder, but I know he's a proud coach and it was an exhale, I think. A huge exhale.''
Burns was so distraught after the game that he declined to meet the media for the first time in his tenure in Boston. Tallas said he didn't blame him.
''To lose games like this, for a while there it was embarrassing,'' Tallas said. ''It could've been a scary game. That team can be a selfish team over there. They love to score goals and they weren't going to quit. I thought we did a good job of keeping our composure in the third period and not giving them too much, but we're going into a bigger building [in Philadelphia Saturday], a bigger team that needs a lot of confidence going into the playoffs, and then Pittsburgh, who's in a playoff fight. This is not how I want to go out on the season. It's so frustrating.''
The Bruins were vastly undermanned, with more AHL players on the roster than NHLers. But they actually took a 1-0 lead on Cameron Mann's goal at 16:39 of the first. However, that was followed by six Panther goals: two by Ray Whitney, two by Ray Sheppard, one by Mark Parrish, and one by Scott Mellanby. The first three came in a span of 2 minutes 50 seconds. It was the first time the Bruins gave up six goals in a period since Feb. 23, 1991, when they were blown out in St. Louis, 9-2.
''It's a disaster right now,'' said Tallas. ''It's hard to imagine that we're ending the season on this kind of note. [Burns] showed a little frustration tonight for the first time in a long time and I don't blame him. He's struggling just as much as all of us.''
Tallas said part of what has made it so hard to bear is that the roster is full of inexperienced players who should be having the time of their lives playing in the NHL. But, by the same token, the players who have been in Boston all season are in agony over the losing and are walking around like zombies while trying to stay positive.
''It's hard to see guys who have been here like Stevie Heinze and Donnie Sweeney, the look in their eyes,'' said Tallas. ''We're all lost souls. It's so frustrating, you can see that in each other. Those guys who have been here for a long time have a lot of pride in that jersey. To end like this, it's so frustrating ... It's embarrassing to us.''
Trailing, 6-1, the Bruins played better in the third period, but the Panthers relaxed a bit. (And who could blame them?) Antti Laaksonen and Eric Nickulas (power play) potted goals for Boston.
''We made some brutal mistakes,'' said Tallas of that fateful second period. ''Their speed kind of caught up to us and caught us by surprise a little bit. It was disastrous. This is just not the way to end the season. I know it's been a disastrous season, but you don't end it anything like this.''
This story ran on page D6 of the Boston Globe on 4/6/2000.
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UNRISE, Fla. - In his three years behind the Bruins' bench, coach Pat Burns has gotten mad before, plenty of times.