BOSTON — The Boston Bruins have been riding an emotional high over the last few weeks.

It’s hard not when you’ve won seven games in a row. Even after their streak was snapped last Thursday in Ottawa, the Bruins followed up the loss with an energy charged victory on the road over the Montreal Canadiens on Saturday night.

But as the B’s returned home to Boston on Monday with a depleted roster, they had nothing left in the tank, falling 3-1 to the Carolina Hurricanes at TD Garden.

“We felt it in the morning. We felt it before the game. It was just a slow day today,” Bruins head coach Marco Sturm said. “I could see it in their eyes. Mentally, physically, we were not 100 percent today, that’s for sure.”

With Charlie McAvoy, Elias Lindholm, Viktor Arvidsson, and Casey Mittelstadt all unavailable due to injury, the Bruins rolled out a semi-make-shift lineup against Carolina.

Freshly called up from AHL Providence, Riley Tufte and Matej Blumel got their first taste of NHL action this season, but didn’t do much to make up for the massive voids they were filling. Neither did the Bruins regulars who did suit up, for that matter.

“I don’t think that’s any excuse at all,” said Hampus Lindholm. ” We still got to play to our identity. That’s what’s been making us successful so far this year.  We don’t want to get too high or too low. I think we’ve been playing some good hockey. Tonight was a night we can learn from and move forward from here.”

Both Boston and Carolina were flat in the games’ first 20 minutes. The two sides traded chances, but none of any real note or consequence, before heading into the intermission in a scoreless tie.

It was in the second period that the Hurricanes began to pull away. Not for anything they themselves did, but simply because the Bruins let them.

The Bruins could barely manage to break the puck out of their own zone as the Hurricanes swirled around them on the forecheck. Eventually, Carolina broke through at 8:25 of the frame when Jordan Staal managed to clean up a loose puck just outside Jeremy Swayman’s crease with just one arm while Andrew Peeke was draped all over him.

It was the same story when the Hurricanes added on to their lead minutes later. The Bruins couldn’t clear the puck, and it eventually wound up in the back of their net as Mark Jankowski put home a rebound to make it 2-0 Carolina.

Swayman finished the night with 29 saves on 32 shots. He kept the game close early by stopping several breakaway chances, including a few from Hurricanes sniper Seth Jarvis. But with little help in front of him and Carolina essentially having free access to the middle of the ice, there was only so much Swayman could do.

Such was the case at 2:33 of the third period, when Taylor Hall stripped Nikita Zadorov of the puck along the wall and beat Swayman off an odd-man rush.

Tufte scored with 9.6 seconds remaining to wipe out Pyotr Kochetkov’s shutout bid, but that was far too little, far too late.

“We just didn’t do a good job,” Sturm said. ” When you’re not sharp, you’re always kind of a step behind. I felt like they jumped in front of us a lot of times. It just seemed like we were late on everything. That was the frustrating part. They didn’t do anything special.”

The Bruins will embark on a four-game, nine-day road trip beginning on Wednesday night against the Anaheim Ducks.

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