This one aspect of Bruins' decision to ride Linus Ullmark will never make sense

BOSTON -- When the bosses of the Boston Bruins sat before the media on Tuesday to try to explain the team's short-circuited run at a Stanley Cup, the use of goaltender Linus Ullmark was one of the major topics of conversation.

But the questions thrown at head coach Jim Montgomery and GM Don Sweeney mostly focused on Ullmark's health. Sweeney swore that Ullmark's late-season injury had "cleared up for him to be eligible to play." Montgomery passed along the information that he spoke to Ullmark after Game 5, and the netminder convinced the coach that he'd be good to go for Game 6.

The context of these questions and answers, though, shows that the point was still being missed.

The real pertinent question, even a week after the season ended, is this: Why did the Bruins suddenly expect Linus Ullmark to be something he's not?

That is to say ... what gave the Bruins confidence that Ullmark was in a position to carry the full goaltending load for a 20-plus-game run to a Stanley Cup?

During the regular season, the 29-year-old Ullmark set a new career high in games started ... with 48. What's more, that was an increase of nine over his previous career high, which he set a year prior by starting 39 games in his first year in Boston.

Last year, after setting that modest career high with 39 starts, he completely fizzled in the playoffs, allowing eight goals on 57 shots faced (.860 save percentage) and posting a 4.16 GAA in his two starts against Carolina. Bruce Cassidy replaced him with Jeremy Swayman in Game 3, and Ullmark didn't play for the remainder of the series.

A year later, after Ullmark had increased his workload by almost 25 percent and suffered a late-season injury, the Bruins decided that they were going to be a one-goalie team. They decided that Linus Ullmark was a horse.

Neither one of those projections ever had a chance of panning out. The Bruins are a team with a goalie rotation, and Linus Ullmark has never handled a heavy workload. Since the start of last season, 20 goalies have started more games than Ullmark. Prior to last season, Ullmark had twice made 34 starts in a season, and he had twice made 20 starts in a season. 

The idea that Ullmark could not just set a new career high in regular-season starts but also start more than 20 high-intensity games in the playoffs? It should have never been entertained.

The closest Montgomery got to explaining that move on Tuesday came when asked if he regretted not making the switch to Swayman sooner.

"In hindsight, absolutely. The mistake I made is, I try to put our players in the best situation to excel," Montgomery said, before getting interrupted by a massive wave of microphone feedback. "There is an added mental grind in the playoffs, and it takes a toll, right? That's what I've learned through this grind is the expectations that were put on our team going into the playoffs, there's a price you pay. Everybody does. And I think we are going to learn from this -- everybody. The players, especially me, I'm going to learn and I'm going to have to help the players push through, which I didn't do this year."

All due respect to Montgomery, but ... none of that makes any sense. And, after the first three words, none of it has anything to do with the question.

Montgomery was asked a follow-up question about what specifically went into the decision to start Ullmark in Games 5 and 6 as well as the decision to start Swayman in Game 7. Aside from rewording his previously stated dependence on goaltender coach Bob Essensa for making the Game 7 decision, Montgomery didn't really offer any clarity aside from believing that Ullmark would play well.

"Well first of all, all season long I said Goalie Bob makes the decision. I make the final decision, right? I'm the one that picks the starter. So, it's not Goalie Bob's decision, but I really rely on him heavily," Montgomery said, slightly adjusting his post-Game 7 assessment of the situation. "And to answer your question specifically, we discussed this as a staff. I will talk in the playoffs especially even more so with Sweens and Cam [Neely]. And in the end, we win Games 3 and 4, so you have two days off. You think Game 5's going to go well. And I personally spoke with Linus and he answered me a real honest question and took ownership of where he was at in Game 5. And what he relayed to me made me believe that you learn and you grow and he was ready to grow and lead us to a Game 6 win. And that, in the end, is what made me decide that he was our goaltender for Game 6."

Again ... it doesn't explain much of anything. Was Montgomery expecting the competitive athlete to beg to be removed from a playoff series?  

It's up to the coach to make decisions that benefit the team, even if it comes at the expense of one individual. In this case, trusting Ullmark's words over his on-ice performance while ignoring the recipe for what made the Bruins successful in the first place helped doom the entire team in the playoffs.

Really, if the Bruins wanted to say that teams don't win Stanley Cups by rotating two goalies somewhat evenly, then they would have made sense. That's true. History would back them up on that decision.

It's also true, though, that no team has ever won 65 regular-season games by riding one goaltender. The Bruins set a record for wins with Swayman starting over 40 percent of the games in net. Swayman started over 46 percent of the team's games over the final 13 weeks of the season. It was, for all intents and purposes, a split. And it delivered record-setting results.

Take that situation, add in a late-season injury for Ullmark, and the decision to declare him as the obvious No. 1 netminder for a long playoff run will forever be baffling. Nothing in the 40-minute press conference on Tuesday helped to clear up even one iota of why that call was made.