Way back on Jan. 18, some hack writer said that the Bruins’ stretch at the time (they were 5-4-0 over their previous nine games and were winning some games they easily could have lost) was as close to a slump as a team that good would get. It wasn’t really a slump, but a great team’s version of a slump. 

Just over three weeks later and one 4-4-1 stretch later, that hack has changed his mind. This is a slump. A real slump. One with which a bad team would be frustrated, and one that should have a great team ticked off. 

Shawn Thornton was feeling just those emotions after the B’s were blanked, 3-0, by the last-place Hurricanes. It marked the third time the Bruins have been shut out this season, and it meant a sweep for the Hurricanes in the four-game season-series against he B’s.

“Same thing we’ve been talking about for the last however long. We absolutely fall asleep in the second period,” a frustrated Thornton said. “Not good enough at all. I don't think we had everyone going. Again.

“It seems to be the same old story. We're not that good that we can just come out and go through the motions and expect to be successful.”

Perhaps for this Bruins team, the trouble they have putting together 60-minute efforts might stem from sitting back and assuming they’ll dominate when they need to. The Bruins are a deep, highly talented squad, but aside from the guys wearing No. 30 and 40, they don’t have anyone who can put the team on their back and deliver a victory. They won the Cup last season and went on a 21-3-1 this season because they were a finely tuned machine, from the first-line center to the last pairing defenseman (well, maybe not Tomas Kaberle or Johnny Boychuk last postseason, but you get the picture).

That sort of team hasn’t been iced for nine games now. The B’s have been so dreadful in the second period (opponents have outscored them, 14-10 in the second in their last nine games), that they have not once entered the third period with a lead in that span. The Bruins have been sluggish, inconsistent and at times drowsy.

Drowsy isn’t what won the Bruins the Cup, or what made them red-hot in November and December. They were lifeless in the second period Thursday, putting just five shots on goal, and by the final 10 minutes of the contest, it seemed they began to lose their cool. 

On a night in which goals and legitimate scoring opportunities were clearly hard to come by, the Bruins needed to make the most of the two power plays they were given in the game. Instead, they took penalties during each power play, cutting their time on the man advantage short by a total of 2:08.

What the Bruins are doing right now isn’t characteristic of them. They pride themselves on what they do and how they go about their business, and this isn’t it. The captain sees it plainly.

“I think what’s really effective for this team, and what is always working for us, is the attitude, the work ethic and the emotions that we have, or we had, during those spans of the games when we were really successful and dominate,” Zdeno Chara said. “[It was] just really, you know, fun to play. Now, we don’t have that. We need to find that, it’s as simple as that.”

Thursday also meant the Bruins’ ugliest team stat lived for another game. With the three goals that the Hurricanes put past Tuukka Rask, the team’s streak of games in which they’ve allowed at least three goals to their opponent reached five games. For those following along at home, the Bruins had never allowed that many goals in more than two games prior to this stretch. 

“Sometimes we’re working, we’re not working smart and there’s a fine line there and we’re not doing that right, it’s obvious,” Patrice Bergeron, who has been a minus-4 over the last two games, said of the team’s play. “We know where to be on the ice we know how to execute, we know the system and we’re just not doing it. We’re just not in sync and it shows.”

The remedy? 

"It’s simple. Show up," Thornton said. "We need all 23 guys showing up and working hard and playing with a bit of an edge and not going over it – that’s when we’re successful. We should know that by now. If we have any passengers, then we’re not successful."

The Bruins know what they’re capable of, so there is no reason to panic over the team’s uncharacteristically woeful play of late. They know what they can be, but maybe that’s both a blessing and a curse. The team has gotten lazy in certain areas, perhaps with the assumption that they can sit back, rely on talent, and watch the scoreboard light up. They’re learning now that it doesn’t work that way, and it’s a lesson they should remember when the games really matter in a couple months.