Coming away with at least one point against Devan Dubnyk and the Minnesota Wild and their league-leading defense would have been a pretty tall task in and of itself. Doing it without David Pastrnak made that task even taller for the Boston Bruins on Thursday night.

Thanks to Tuukka Rask, again, the Bruins had a chance to come away with at least one point. They were 44.5 seconds away from forcing overtime against the same Wild squad that steamrolled past the B’s 5-0 nearly one month ago without the services of Rask.

One bounce changed that.

Looking to get back into the play after colliding in front of Rask, Adam McQuaid found himself on the unfortunate end of a bad bounce as the Bruins were looking to force overtime. With traffic in front of Rask, Mikael Granlund threw the puck in the area deflecting off of McQuaid’s skate and past the Bruins’ netminder for the only goal that the Wild needed.

Here is what we learned as the Bruins dropped to 10-7-0 following the 1-0 loss in St. Paul.

Backes at square one

As long as its still an option for coaches, the debate on the offsides challenge will seemingly never end.

The Bruins found themselves on the wrong end of the spectrum again on the offsides challenge as David Backes’ goal was negated in the second period after Bruce Boudreau’s successful challenge. The play itself showed that Ryan Spooner crossed the blue-line before David Krejci was able to corral the puck into the offensive end that led to the sequence.

In a game where goals were hard to come by for both the Bruins and Wild, the last thing that needs to be brought up is whether or not the offsides challenge should remain. Given that it’s a judgment call similar to the way pass interference is called in football or in a sense balls and strikes in baseball, there’s an argument that it shouldn’t be reviewed. That would be a fair point especially since pass interference — and other football infractions — and balls and strikes aren’t subject to review in their respective sports. For now, that’s a story for another day.

Bruins aren’t quite there yet vs. playoff caliber teams

Of the Bruins’ 10 victories this season, only three of them came against teams that are currently in the top eight – the Lightning, Devils and Jets. Six of their seven losses have come against teams that would make the playoffs if the season ended today – losing twice each versus the Wild, Canadiens and Rangers.

On one hand, the Bruins could use some marquee wins as the season progresses. On the other hand, the Black and Gold have at least taken care of business against teams that are beneath them in the standings, which is something that came back to haunt them last season.

Over the next eight days, the Bruins will face four teams that are ahead of them in the standings that include rematches against the Jets and Lightning and their first matchups of the year with the Blues and Senators. For those who believe that being in the top eight by Thanksgiving weekend is a good indicator for the rest of the season, these slate of games will be a good test for a young Black and Gold team that hopes to return to the Playoffs after a two-year absence.