Gritty Bruins Fall to Golden Knights 6-5 in Vegas late last night

By: Ryan Keenan

October 17th, 2025 11:00am EST

Ian Maule

Bruins came out strong starting this 2025-26 NHL season with 3 straight wins, and playing solid hockey. Although after falling to the Lightning last Sunday and Vegas late last night they have now lost two straight, and look to be falling into place.

In my estimation, expectations for the Bruins this season were fairly low after missing the playoffs last season, and a team looking to be entering a rebuild. All in all this is fine with me, the Bruins had a long stretch of solid hockey led by the Bergeron, Krejci, and Marchand core. Unfortunately, they only won 1 Stanley Cup, but they made it to 3 appearances, and competed every year for give or take 13 years. Although, these days are gone and they are now entering the rebuild phase in the NHL.

With that being said, coming back to last night the Bruins took an early lead in Vegas, and kept the game competitive all game, but ended up dropping the game 6-5. In a scoring barrage, the Bruins had a lead early in the 1st period that lasted about 1 minute, then ended the period tied 2-2. They fell behind in the 2nd period 5-3, and ended up coming up short in the 3rd after falling behind 6-3, and putting a couple in the net to make it 6-5 but could never tie the game back up. Now, I will be honest, I fell asleep shortly after they fell behind 5-3 at the end of the 2nd period. Also, I was flipping back and forth between the ALCS game, TNF and the Bruins game. What I saw in the moments I watched though, seemed to keep the same picture painted in my mind of this year's Boston Bruins.

While they may not be the most talented, or the best looking team at times, they sure are fun to watch. This is what I have seen so far from them, is a team effort of a group of guys that play hard, hustle, and will do whatever it takes to win. Now with that being said, the talent is not there to win night in and night out, but it will never be for a lack of effort. This at times for me can be substantially more entertaining than some of the best teams to watch. Don’t get me wrong, really good times are always a blast to watch, but sometimes the less talented team with more heart and passion is more fun. Low expectations, exciting, gritty, passionate, and hardworking is how I would describe watching the Bruins so far this year, it has only been 5 games, but if they play like this all year I will certainly keep watching. 

The Golden Knights are widely considered a frontrunner in the NHL this year, and the Bruins managed to keep a game this close should be considered a success in some estimation. Allowing 6 goals to any team is going to make it difficult to secure a win at this level at hockey. The one that hurt the most was the shorthanded 2nd period goal by Paval Dorofeyev that extended the Vegas lead to 5-3. The Bruins did not help Swaymen in the net who was faced to go up against 37 shots, allowing 6 of them in the net. The Bruins only managed 24 shots at Vegas goalkeeper Schmid. This will not be a recipe for success, along with Vegas having 6 powerplay opportunities capitalizing on 2 of them. Despite this the Bruins still hung around, and kept the game close giving us a chance all the way to the last horn.

Gritty and competitive is turning into the Bruins theme early on this year, without the skill we have seen in years past. Who knows how far that can get us in a sport like hockey, but we will see how it matches up against Colorado, as the Bruins head to Denver for a Saturday night game starting at 9 pm. The Avalanche have started the year 4-0-1, and have been playing very good hockey in what should be another good test for this Bruins team against a top opponent.