OTTAWA -- The way coach Guy Boucher sees it, the Ottawa Senators were asking for trouble in Game 1 of their Eastern Conference First Round series against the Boston Bruins, and they got it.
After holding the Bruins without a shot in the second period and leading 1-0, the Senators turned over the puck nine times on the shifts leading to Boston's goals in a 2-1 win Wednesday that gave the Bruins a 1-0 lead in the best-of-7 series. Game 2 is at Canadian Tire Centre on Saturday (3 p.m. ET; NBC, SN, TVA Sports).
"Clearly, that's what killed us," Boucher said of the turnovers. "We looked scared to lose instead of hungry to win. We backed off for no reason. We weren't going after them in their zone. We weren't going after them in the neutral zone, either. We packed it in our zone, kind of cocooning in our D zone for no reason. That's just a mental state for me. We were asking for trouble."
Boston's top line of center Patrice Bergeron between left wing Brad Marchand and right wing David Pastrnak pinned the Senators in their zone, and Ottawa turned over the puck five times before Marchand scored the winner with 2:33 to go in the third period.
"We were kind of in disbelief when they scored that last one with a couple of minutes left," Senators defenseman Cody Ceci said. "We thought we were in control for most of the game. To have it slip away in the third period definitely hurts. We've got to move on as quick as we can."
Ceci and defense partner Dion Phaneuf along with the line of Jean-Gabriel Pageau, Tom Pyatt and Mike Hoffman couldn't get the puck out against Bergeron's line and wound up on the ice for a shift of 1:13 before Marchand scored.
Ceci said the Senators learned a lesson in Game 1 and would take a different approach if the same circumstances arise.
"A lot of it is mental when you're tired, (you've got to) just to hang on to [the puck] that extra second and make the right play or even ice it," Ceci said. "It's kind of frowned upon to ice the puck. It makes it look like a bad play, but really, in times like that, that's all you need is an icing. You can take a step back, get a breather and start over again and hopefully get the puck out clean the next time.
"Everybody was so tired, something was bound to happen."
The Senators are looking at it like they lost Game 1 because of what they did rather than what the Bruins did, and they're confident they can fix it.
"We gave them everything that they got, really," forward Mark Stone said. "There's still a long series to go here. We knew we weren't going to sweep them."
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