The Boston Bruins' 5-1 loss to the St. Louis Blues on Monday was not a typical Bruins collapse that we've seen this season, and the team acknowledged that.

BOSTON – Oftentimes when a team gets blown out by four goals, the losing side will ‘burn the tape’ and move on. Typically it's reserved for when things are so bad that there’s not much to learn from it other than not letting it affect the next game.

The Boston Bruins experienced several cases of this type of game, a 5-1 loss to the New York Islanders on March 2 being the most recent. After a week of strong performances and a four-game point streak to go with it, the Bruins lost 5-1 again, this time to the St. Louis Blues on Monday.

But Monday’s loss wasn’t quite like the others. The Bruins lacked the spark needed to get rolling in the first period, but it wasn’t a factor of disastrous play. A flukey off-the-boards goal and 5-on-3 power play from St. Louis put the Blues ahead 2-0 by the end of the first period, and a stellar game in net from Joel Hofer (36 saves) made it impossible to come back.

“I think before the game, you’re ready for it. I just don’t think we just had it today in the beginning,” Pavel Zacha said after the game. “That’s something as a player, we have to be prepared for. I think we know exactly what to do, how to play against them, I just think we as players, we didn’t put it on the ice there and then it was a little bit too late once we started playing.”

The Bruins outshot St. Louis 32-16 at 5-on-5. They generated 17 high-danger scoring chances, eight coming in the third period, and finished with 3.28 expected goals for, according to Natural Stat Trick. The Blues had just 1.68 expected goals for.

Yet the score that counted was 5-1 in favor of St. Louis. For Boston, the execution – among other things – was just off. Pavel Zacha missed an open net right before David Pastrnak scored at 1:48 of the third. Justin Brazeau’s back door pass to set up Jesper Boqvist was narrowly tipped away at 3:25 of the third, and there were similar near-misses all game.

For Bruins coach Jim Montgomery, the focus going forward is simple.

“Continue to refine our game, continue to get better and to consistently be able to find our game, no matter if we’re playing well, to continue it, or if we have started the game poorly, to get to it right away,” Montgomery said on Tuesday.

Montgomery said he has seen his team’s ability to finish checks, score and play physical. With 15 games left in the season and the playoffs quickly approaching, the Bruins will need to find consistency.

Despite how Monday’s game played out, players like Brandon Carlo are trying to take what they can from it heading into the postseason.

“You’re gonna have to have a short-term memory in some situations and you see it throughout each playoffs,” Carlo said on Tuesday. “There’s gonna be ups and downs and things like that, so I’m actually thankful for it because I think it will better prepare us, but we need to make sure to take care of those areas when we are bouncing back from those games.”

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