Julien, Bruins face first test in long road to recovery

by Bob Herpen
Phanatic Hockey Editor

How do you approach a regular season after which your team blows a 3-0 series deficit – one of only three teams in your sport and of just four teams all time in the history of professional athletics in North America?

How can you keep that focus because the team which accomplished the feat against you only plays your club four times in an 82-game season, with no guarantee of another postseason matchup?

How can you get your club to play disciplined and winning hockey when certain players’ lingering memories of that playoff failure are going to take the forefront?

Well, Bruins head coach Claude Julien is about to find out. He’s got just over four hours to figure out a way to beat the Philadelphia Flyers, and to put a permanent “L” in their column with a just-as-permanent “W” in Boston’s standings.

Last May, the Bruins hung three consecutive losses on the Orange and Black to open their Eastern Conference Semifinal series. They couldn’t hang a fourth and final one in order to clinch the set and earn a trip to the semifinals for the first time since 1992.

In a grim reversal of what the Boston Red Sox did to the New York Yankees just six years prior, a progressively-healthier Flyers team overwhelmed an injury-riddled Bruins club by taking four in a row – the final insult coming in a Game 7 at Boston where the Bruins failed to lock down a near iron-clad 3-0 first-period advantage.

No matter what happens tonight at the big bank building on South Broad Street, it cannot change what is written in the history books. A Bruins win can only provide pale shelter for the weight of an historical burden the franchise carries with it. Even if the men in the spoked B happen to go four-for-four in the regular season against Philly, does it really soothe the burns or ease the doubts?

Two years ago, Julien led the Bruins to one of their best records in franchise annals, going 53-19-10. Following a four-game sweep of hated Montreal in the opening round, the B’s were downed in a seventh-game overtime by the over-matched but lionhearted Carolina Hurricanes.

Last year, there were 13 fewer wins but a tougher lineup slogged their way past Buffalo in six before suffering through an epic and fruitless battle against a once-fierce rival.

The 2010-11 Boston Bruins are 12-8-2. The 2010-11 Philadelphia Flyers are 15-6-4. As it was last year, one team is good but the other is slightly better.

Unlike a long-standing ethos in the Flyers front office where success beyond the regular season is determined by how far the team goes in matching up with the club that had just beaten it in the playoffs, the Bruins know they can’t merely use their resources to knock off one team. Spending money has been an issue under the Jacobs’ ownership, but desire and proper allocation of resources hasn’t.

Still, wouldn’t one victory, and then another, and maybe another against the Flyers serve to boost the Bruins’ overall confidence? It’s not the whole story. What if they lose four in a row this year? Will that cause a mental block that will cause trouble down the road? What if each game goes to a shootout? What does that prove to either side?

From the Flyers’ perspective, a win or a loss here on the first day of December only affects them in terms of playoff positioning in the conference. The more the wins come earlier, the better off they’ll be in the long run when the inevitable slump occurs.

They already have a Herculean accomplishment in their pocket to bolster their collective confidence. Another set of wins against a pesky conference foe will certainly boost it further.

If not, it’s just a loss, something they need to learn from and move on. There is a tomorrow, they know that – just one of more than a hundred over a six-month season – because they stared down the specter of hockey’s version of the End of Days four times and never flinched.

What do the Bruins find when they peer at the abyss? You might have to ask members of the 1942 Detroit Red Wings or the 1975 Pittsburgh Penguins.

Here and now, only Julien and his players know for sure, and they need to figure out how to deal with it to forge a stronger bond moving forward. They need to take a big step and stare back on Wednesday because the Flyers are now an indelible part of that bleakness.