How the Boston Bruins are Embracing Adversity, Looking to Grow

The Boston Bruins aren’t running away from adversity.

After dropping three consecutive games and giving up 17 cumulative goals across those contests, the B’s refocused with their first full practice in 10 days at Warrior Ice Arena Wednesday morning.

The sentiment in the room? Embrace the challenge and grow from it.

“Adversity is good. I think it’s something we didn’t really have much last year. This is a bit of a change of pace in here,” Charlie McAvoy said to reporters Wednesday.

“You get used to winning so much that the losses, they hurt – they feel a lot different than maybe how they used to feel when they’re so few and far in between.”

The Bruins are coming off a Monday 5-2 loss to Columbus Blue Jackets, and coach Jim Montgomery has shaken up the lineup ahead of Thursday’s matchup against the San Jose Sharks at TD Garden.

While Montgomery kept the James van Riemsdyk - Charlie Coyle - Trent Frederic line together because of its consistent productivity, he said he wasn’t “seeing good enough results” from the rest of his combinations.

Jake DeBrusk - Pavel Zacha - David Pastrnak

Brad Marchand - Matt Poitras - Danton Heinen

James van Riemsdyk - Charlie Coyle - Trent Frederic

Jakub Lauko - Johnny Beecher - Morgan Geekie

Oskar Steen

Hampus Lindholm - Charlie McAvoy

Matt Grzelcyk - Brandon Carlo

Derek Forbort - Kevin Shattenkirk

Ian Mitchell

Jeremy Swayman

Linus Ullmark

Swayman is set to start against the Sharks after getting pulled in the second period against the Blue Jackets and replaced with Ullmark – marking the first time the Bruins made an in-game goalie change this season.

“I want to finish every game I start and that’s an edge that I know I play with, and that’s one of my MO’s,” Swayman said to reporters Wednesday.

“Definitely excited to get another whack at it. Again, it’s a long season, we roll day by day. Yesterday’s in the past and that’s what our culture is, that’s what our mindset is. We have two points on the line tomorrow, that’s all we care about.”

Beyond the goaltending, Montgomery is looking for more checking, physicality, speed and attention to small details from his team. The coach said the B’s have not been good enough at taking time and space away from their opponents, and defending the rush remains an area of improvement for the group.

“I think we’ve just been an easy team to play against here – it’s not just the last three games, it’s probably the last six to seven,” Montgomery said to reporters Wednesday. “We always want to play with pace and that’s the other area of our game that we think is slow is our pace of play. That’s with the puck and without it.”

Montgomery was blunt in his assessment of Boston’s recent performances and, like his players, isn’t shying away from the opportunity to evolve from the recent game-costing mistakes.

“It’s about moving forward. In a lot of ways, we’ve welcomed this type of adversity. We knew it was going to come. We knew we weren’t a 14-1-3 team, and that’s just being honest,” Montgomery said.

The Bruins’ 7 p.m. matchup against the Sharks on Thursday offers them a chance to start doing all the little things right. Losing to the Blue Jackets – who have the fewest wins in the Eastern conference – was bad. Falling to the last place, 5-15-2 Sharks would stir up a whole other conversation.

“We have two points on the line tomorrow, that’s all we care about,” Swayman said.

Spearheaded by its leadership group, Boston is taking the turmoil one game at a time and controlling what’s directly in front of it.

“We’re alright in here. We’re in a good spot in the standings,” McAvoy said. “There’s no need to panic, but this is not our standard. We don’t want to see it go any further.”