from Steve Conroy of the Boston Herald,

This one hurts, and it is going to hurt for a very long time.

Not only did the Bruins players and many others believe they had the best team in this Stanley Cup Final that slipped away from them, it also very well could have been the last best chance for a core of aging greats such as Zdeno Chara, Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci to win that second Cup....

But with their 4-1 loss Wednesday in Game 7 to the St. Louis Blues at the Garden — the first time a Cup Final Game 7 ever had been played in Boston — there was a distinct feeling they let something wonderful, something attainable escape them.

Millions of New England hockey fans — some diehard, some just on board in the last month — may feel let down by the B’s this morning. But no one feels more so than the B’s themselves. When the room opened after the loss, Jake DeBrusk was sitting in his uniform still, holding his head and trying to figure out what just happened. Meeting reporters, Brad Marchand was hoarse after an obvious crying jag he had on the ice. When asked what his homecoming had meant to him, Weymouth’s Charlie Coyle tried to answer before getting choked up and then was mercifully excused by a club media relations member.

It was, understandably, a tough room.

“It’s a heartbreaker,” said Marchand, eyes red with emotion. “It’s tough to describe. They just took our dream, our lifetime dream away from us. Everything we’ve worked for our entire lives, 60 minutes away from that. … You can’t describe it.”

continued

Below, watch Brad Marchand and Tuukku Rask post-game in the dressing room.