Photo: Bridget Samuels/Ikeastan Hockey

The Bruins entered this week as winners of two straight — including a 4-0 blanking of the Ottawa Senators last Saturday. Boston made it three in a row with a cake-walk 5-2 victory over the mismatched Buffalo Sabres to start the new week on Wednesday night, before falling victim to their recent two-game skid. The Black and Gold then dropped back-to-back games — 5-3 to the Washington Capitals on Friday night,  and a 2-1 shootout defeat by the hands of the St. Louis Blues last night in The Hub.

For the last two weeks, finding a top performer within this hockey club was quite simple: Tim Thomas, Zdeno Chara, and Nathan Horton were the best of the best. But last week, it took some digging and searching to find that diamond in the rough throughout their 1-1-1 record last week.

Here are five players that I selected to choose from:

Brad Machand: 1-2-3, plus-3 (team-high) and six hits.
Michael Ryder: 2-2-4 (team-high in points), one power play goal, plus-1.
Nathan Horton: 1-1-2, minus-1, team-high 10 shots on goal.
Patrice Bergeron: 1-1-2 9shorthanded goal, power play point), won 30-of-50 face-offs (60%)
Tuukka Rask: .958 save-percentage, 1.42 goals-against average in 84 minutes of playing time