Boston looks baked for season after Cooke rematch, more notes

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Bruins captain Zdeno Chara tried his best to relight a fire under his team by taking on Pittsburgh's Mike Rupp. Bruce Bennett/Getty Images

It was, without a doubt, the most heavily-hyped match in what's been a listless season for the Boston Bruins. For the price of admission, a boisterously disenchanted fan base wanted to see the hometowners (hard to call 'em heroes at this juncture) wrest two points from the Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins and have someone, anyone, exact a little revenge for Matt Cooke's near decapitation of Marc Savard the last time the two sides met. Not necessarily in that order.

They quickly got some of what they came for. Bruins enforcer Shawn Thornton hopped onto the ice less than two minutes into the game, a surprisingly early entrance for the fourth-liner. Pens coach Dan Bylsma obliged by sending Cooke over the boards. Seconds later, the two squared off to the left of Marc-Andre Fleury.

Give Cooke some credit. As the man who delivered that Grade 2 concussion to Savard with a ruthless hit 12 days ago, he understood his role in this drama. Responsibility is at the core of the Code, after all. So he stood up to the larger Thornton and even got in the first punch before he was felled by a cascade of rights that continued even after he fell to the ice. And the crowd, silenced by so many disappointing nights this season, roared.

That each player was able to skate to the box under his own power was no small blessing considering the carnival of carnage the league has staged over the past couple weeks. No blood. No broken bodies. Just five minutes to rest some sore knuckles, and on with the game.

The question then was: would that be enough? Would the Bruins be satisfied with their pound of flesh? Apparently they were. A little too satisfied. "Him stepping up and doing the right thing put some water on the fire," Thornton said of Cooke afterwards.

And so, instead of building on the emotion of the beating, the Bruins seemed drained by it. They managed just five shots on net in the first period, and five more in the second. Even a fight instigated by captain Zdeno Chara couldn't raise their intensity. And another questionable play by Cooke, this time an apparent slew foot on Dennis Seidenberg behind the Boston net, went unchallenged.

Big, Bad Bruins? More like little, sleepy cubs.

The Pens took advantage of that lethargy, scoring a goal in each period and limiting the offensively-challenged Bruins to just 17 shots on the way to a decisive 3-0 win. What could have been the defining moment of this frustrating campaign, a spiritual circling of the wagons that empowered and emboldened the Bruins as they aimed to secure a playoff bid and erase a season's worth of disappointment was, instead, rock bottom.

No question the Pens, even without Evgeni Malkin in the lineup, are a more talented team. That said, they're hardly invincible. Perhaps if Boston had spent more time studying tape of how the Devils methodically disabled Pittsburgh's leaden defense on Wednesday, they'd have gotten what they really needed out of this game: two points.

Because, for all the talk of avenging Savard, that moment of truth quietly passed nearly two weeks ago. The time to address that bit of business was either while Savard was lying on the ice or the very next moment that Cooke stepped on it. That it was left to fester and distort what really mattered on the night is a blight on the character of this team. And the fans, who seemed alone in recognizing that winning and physical accountability are not mutually exclusive, let them know it.

So now what?

Nearly 40 years removed from their last Stanley Cup -- a sad state highlighted by a pre-game ceremony honoring members of the legendary 1970 squad -- this team will go down to the wire just to make the postseason. With 12 games left, the eighth-place Bruins hold a slim, three-point lead over the Rangers and Thrashers, with a must-win game against New York on Sunday afternoon. On paper, there's hope. But the serenade of boos that filled the building as the B's skated off tells you that the fans believe that the timer has already pinged on this season.

At this point, why believe otherwise? Listening to Claude Julien rattle off a list of excuses for his team's performance had to be painful for the die-hards who believe his robotic approach to the game is a big part of the problem. And if young players like Milan Lucic and Blake Wheeler, the league's smallest 6-5, 205-pound winger, can't drum up the hunger to make an impact in a game like that one, then when?

They'll put up with a lot in Boston. But a lack of passion? That's an ender.