KANATA, Ontario - When asked who his starting goalie would be for tonight's match against Ottawa, coach Claude Julien, as he usually does on a non-game day, sidestepped the question yesterday.
"Can I think about it?" he said.
In reality, however, Julien doesn't need to ponder the results that Alex Auld has given him, and how the 6-foot-5-inch puckstopper is in a rhythm that shouldn't be altered.
While Tim Thomas has hit the physical and mental wall (he's been pulled in three of his last six starts), Auld has stood tall at a time when Boston's spitball offense and broken-down defense require near-perfection in goal.
Auld hasn't been greatly rewarded for his performance (a shootout loss, a 2-1 win, and an overtime setback in his last three starts), but his numbers illustrate the efficiency with which he's bricked up the Boston cage amid Thomas's struggles. In his last three starts, Auld has allowed only two goals - a rebound by Washington forward Brooks Laich that came after the Bruins couldn't clear the puck, and a shot by Florida forward Nathan Horton that banked in off the leg of Mark Stuart.
While Auld has posted a .978 save percentage over those three starts, the Bruins haven't given him much help at the other end, scoring only two goals of their own (five-on-three strikes by Zdeno Chara and Marco Sturm in last Saturday's 2-1 victory over the Capitals) while getting blanked in two of the matches (1-0 to the Rangers in the shootout on Sunday, 1-0 to the Panthers in overtime on Tuesday).
The Boston bosses still consider Thomas the No. 1 goalie. But Auld is capable of going on streaks and has been a reliable goalie when he's been given heavy workloads. In 2005-06, while serving as Vancouver's go-to goalie, Auld went 33-26-6 in 67 appearances, posting a 2.94 goals-against average and a .902 save percentage.
After arriving from Phoenix this season in exchange for forward Nate DiCasmirro, Auld won his first three Boston appearances (five goals allowed on 97 total shots, a .948 save percentage) while Thomas was down with a groin injury and started six games in a row, going 4-2-0.
"No doubt he's been as good as he can be right now," said Julien. "The toughest task he has is that he can't go out and score goals for us. [Sunday] was that example: shutting a team down for the whole game, getting a shutout, but taking a loss in the loss column.
"He's given us a chance. I think it's up to us to give him a little bit of help up front and find some ways to score some goals."
Empty net
During their 2-3-1 stretch in March, the Bruins have averaged 1.5 goals per game.
"We're a team that hasn't scored a ton of goals all year," said Julien. "We have to keep games tight. We do a good job of that. We had some great opportunities [Sunday] in the third to score that goal. You can call them good saves or call them missed opportunities. We need to bear down a little more."
It hasn't helped that Marc Savard, Boston's leading point man, has struggled this month. Savard has three helpers on the power play (two against Washington Saturday, one against the Capitals in the 10-2 debacle on March 3), but the No. 1 center hasn't recorded an even-strength point since March 1, when he had a five-on-five assist in Boston's 3-2 shootout victory over Atlanta. Savard has scored 40.8 percent of his points (31 of 76) on the power play.
"I'm not going to point out one player, because when you don't score much in the last few games, I think it's a combination of everybody," Julien said. "You go down the list and there's a lot of guys that we know can score and we hope they'll find the range again. This is the time of year where it gets a little tougher to score goals."
Chara day-to-day
Yesterday, Chara remained in Boston to undergo evaluation on the upper-body injury he suffered Saturday. Chara, who missed his first game of the season Sunday, is considered day-to-day. Julien said there was a chance he could travel to Ottawa in time for tonight's match if his injury progresses . . . Aaron Ward was one of six Bruins (Thomas, Matt Lashoff, Petteri Nokelainen, Jeremy Reich, and Vladimir Sobotka were the others) to participate in a morning session at Bell Sensplex, the Senators' practice facility. Ward, missing for the last four games because of a bruised right foot, made it through the entire practice and should be ready for tonight. "He's looking fine," said Julien. "Up until the last minute, he was a possibility for [Sunday]." Ward is now wearing carbon-fiber flaps on each boot to protect his insteps. Had he been wearing the flap on his right skate, Ward believes, he might have escaped injury.
Put 'em up
Nokelainen said he didn't have much time to brace himself for the fight with New York forward Chris Drury's Sunday. Nokelainen hit defenseman Marek Malik, turned, and found Drury in his face. It was Nokelainen's first NHL fight . . . One day after Boston's last game against the Senators (a 4-0 victory Feb. 26), Ottawa general manager Bryan Murray fired coach John Paddock and took over the bench. Approximately 10 months earlier, the Bruins turned a similar trick, getting an opposing coach fired a day after playing his team. On April 2, 2007, less than 24 hours after recording a 4-1 win over the Bruins, Julien was fired by New Jersey GM Lou Lamoriello.
Fluto Shinzawa can be reached at fshinzawa@globe.com
