Bruins deserved to lose to the Wild

Tuukka Rask, second from left, had to watch from the bench as the Bruins sought to tie the game late in the third period. Barry Chin/Globe Staff/Globe Staff

The Wild are a very good team.

They have an ace defenseman in Ryan Suter. Zach Parise, their best player, plays with an engine that never runs out of premium. They roll four high-paced, skilled, offensive-minded lines.

But even very good teams should not find their legs in the third period. On the road. On the second of back-to-back away games. And against a team that locks down two-goal third-period leads.

The team that should have limped to the finish scored three goals in a 9:46 stretch to claim a 4-3 win over the Bruins. Tuukka Rask stared down 42 shots, the most rubber he’s seen all season.

The Wild deserved to win. The Bruins did not.

“It better be a good lesson that we can’t take any lead — two goals, three goals, anything — lightly,” said Milan Lucic (1-1—2, seven hits), who was a mammoth presence all night. “We’ve got to take this as a lesson that we’ve got to play for a full 60 minutes. It’s the NHL, right? Best players. Best teams. That’s why you’ve got to play your best for a full 60.”

The Bruins have to play near-perfect games to survive the loss of Zdeno Chara. They did that on Saturday in Toronto. They had 20 players rolling in rhythm — being strong on the walls, collapsing in front, winning battles, breaking out of the defensive zone, and going up the ice as one.

There were too many segments against Minnesota where the Bruins were light on their sticks, second to races, and careless in getting the puck out. The Wild made them pay.

“They were just first on it everywhere,” said Bruins coach Claude Julien. “Winning the battles, winning the races. The commitment to win was there a lot more than it was for us.”

It will be easier for skilled teams such as Minnesota to crank the burners to high heat on the Chara-less Bruins. Top-line threats like Parise, Mikael Granlund, and Jason Pominville (a combined 13 shots on goal) will have more room to dance around.

“[Chara] controls a game,” Parise said. “I know personally I’ve been matched up against him quite a bit playing in New Jersey. He just makes such a difference out there. He plays 30 minutes, all situations. It’s a tough hole to fill. Any team, if you lose your No. 1 defenseman, it’s going to hurt.”

But it’s not just that the Bruins are missing their stopper. Chara’s unavailability creates a trickle-down effect that shows up in neon, boldface, and italics lower in the lineup.

The No. 3 pairing of Matt Bartkowski and Zach Trotman was on the ice for two of Minnesota’s four goals. On the winning goal, Torey Krug and Adam McQuaid couldn’t do much to interrupt Minnesota’s down-low cycle before Marco Scandella’s point shot fluttered past Rask.

When Chara and Kevan Miller are healthy, Krug and McQuaid are a possible third pairing. Bartkowski is in the press box. Trotman is in Providence.

Of the group, Bartkowski (a team-low 8:56 of ice time) is fighting the puck the most. His confidence is in the basement. He is playing as if he’s afraid the puck will land on his stick and turn into a grenade. There is nowhere to hide when your confidence is shot.

But defensemen like Bartkowski are put in uncomfortable spots when their forwards do not do the heavy lifting up the ice. The Bruins emphasize aggressive backchecking to bring numbers back into the defensive zone. They’re supposed to win races, support battles, and serve as outlets with one priority in mind: getting the puck out.

Late in the second and for most of the third, the Wild were first on pucks. Their defensemen hurtled down the walls and overwhelmed the Bruins wings. The Minnesota forwards swarmed on the forecheck to close down the Bruins’ D-to-D breakouts — they were especially aggressive on the weak side — and forced turnovers that led to offensive chances.

The result was in the numbers. The Wild attempted 71 shots compared with the Bruins’ 57. Minnesota controlled the puck. When they did, they put it on net. If not for Rask (38 saves), several more could have slipped in.

“We’re a checking team that scores,” Lucic said. “It’s not a good thing when you’re giving up that many shots. We’ve just got to communicate better and execute better in our D-zone so we can get rolling the other way.”

The Bruins were in good shape when they got the puck out and settled into their forechecking game. In the first, Lucic’s offensive-zone plastering of Justin Falk led to a cough-up. Moments later, with Lucic providing middle drive and opening up a passing lane for David Krejci, Seth Griffith reeled in his center’s dish and beat Niklas Backstrom for the team’s first goal.

In the second, a clever Lucic bank off the wall launched Gregory Campbell up the ice. Griffith converted Campbell’s net-front dish for his second goal.

But Krejci’s line didn’t have much support. The other three lines couldn’t generate much sustained pressure. They spent too much time chasing the puck in their own zone.

Tuesday’s third period underscored the team’s push-and-pull 5-6-0 start. Once the Bruins extinguish one flare-up, another flickers to life. Their actions are hesitant instead of instinctive. They’ve spent a lot of the month out of synch.

“Just not doing the right things, especially in the D-zone, where we’re so good,” Lucic said. “We give up three goals in the third period, which is very uncharacteristic of our team. Eventually, you have to take a step back and say to yourself, ‘You’ve got to respect the game plan and play as a team.’ You saw in Toronto what it can do when you play together. It makes it a lot easier to play as an individual and as a team. We have to focus on that moving forward.”