Thoughts on the Upcoming Boston Bruins Season
With the 2020-21 NHL season just two short weeks away from puck drop, and a Boston sports legend having just signed elsewhere, I thought it might be a good time to share my thoughts on the current state of the Boston Bruins.
Let’s start in net, shall we?
Goaltending
The black and gold will head into the shortened 56-game season with the 2019-20 William M. Jennings Trophy winners in Tuukka Rask and Jaroslav Halak. The duo surrendered a league-low 174 goals in last year’s 70-game regular season.
Every Bruins fan knows that Rask will become an unrestricted free agent at seasons’ end. But for now, let’s just focus on the upcoming season. There is no reason to expect a large drop-off in Rask's play. He is coming off a season in which he was a finalist for the Vezina Trophy having recorded a .929 SV%, 2.12 GAA and five shutouts in 41 regular-season games. There are certainly people who will bring up the situation in the bubble but, as I’ve previously written, it is unfair to comment on the situation if one doesn’t know all the facts and if one wasn’t in the position him or herself.
As for Halak, who tallied a .919 SV%, 2.39 GAA and three shutouts in 31 regular season games in the 2019-20 season, the Bruins are once again in good hands if Rask should need to miss time.
Goaltending should not by a worrisome problem this season.
Defense
Oh boy.
Let’s just get one thing out of the way. Zdeno Chara is gone. It sucks but it’s just the way it is. Obviously, myself and most other Bruins fans out there wish the Bruins had re-signed him but they didn’t and there’s nothing we can do about it.
https://twitter.com/NHLBruins/status/1344431107094228993?s=20
Now that we’ve cleared that up, the defense is going to be a clear weak spot for this Bruins team. The three players we know for certain that will be part of the equation are Charlie McAvoy, Brandon Carlo and Matt Grzelcyk. McAvoy and Carlo are elite defenders while Grzelcyk is a bit undersized but is a great puck moving defenseman who, in my opinion, should replace Torey Krug on the first power play unit.
After that, there are a lot of questions and not a lot of answers. Kevan Miller signed a one-year deal with the club this offseason but he hasn’t played in an NHL game since April of 2019. Young guys such as Jeremy Lauzon, Urho Vaakanainen and Jakub Zboril are sure to see some action but the three have only played in a combined 44 regular-season games. And then there’s John Moore.
The opportunity is there for the youth to improve but there is sure to be some – and maybe a lot of – growing pains along the way. This won’t make the goaltending job any easier for Rask or Halak.
OFFENSE
Despite their struggles to generate scoring in the bubble against the Tampa Bay Lightning, the offense should be a bright spot this season for the Bruins.
Once Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak return to the lineup after recovering from their offseason surgeries, Patrice Bergeron will continue to center arguably the top line in the NHL. During last year’s regular season, Marchand, Bergeron and Pastrnak combined for 107 of the team’s 227 regular-season goals, good for 47.1% of the team’s scoring. Opposing teams know what’s coming and they still can’t stop it.
On the second line, it looks as if David Krejci will finally see some consistency in his linemates in Jake DeBrusk and Ondrej Kase. All Bruins fans know what Krejci brings to the table. On his left side, DeBrusk is a guy who will look to really take his game to the next level after a mediocre 2019-20.
Having just signed a two-year contract extension, he will also need to prove that he is worthy of a long-term deal after the 2021-2022 season.
As for Kase, I think we’re all eager to see how well he’ll compliment DeBrusk and Krejci throughout the course of a regular season. We saw just how dominant this line has the potential to be in the bubble and with Kase in peak physical shape, there’s a reason for optimism.
The third line should be a real bright spot for the black and gold. With the addition of a consistent 20-goal scorer in right winger Craig Smith, the opposing team might never touch the puck with this line on the ice as both Smith and center Charlie Coyle boast a CF% of over 50. Add Anders Bjork on the left side and with the number of opportunities he’ll get with the increased possession, the sky is the limit for these three.
As for the fourth line, I just don’t know. I’m going to guess it will be three of the following players and leave it at that: Sean Kuraly, Par Lindholm, Chris Wagner, Greg McKegg, Nick Ritchie, Karson Kuhlman, Jack Studnicka, Trent Frederic and Zach Senyshyn.
PREDICTION
I’m generally a bit of a pessimist when it comes to the Bruins. After the way the last two seasons have ended followed by the departure of a guy who has been the captain of the team for the last 14 years, I think that’s fair. But today I’m going to choose to be an optimist. Maybe it’s because 2020 is over, who knows. Nevertheless, here goes:
The Boston Bruins are going to win the Stanley Cup in 2021. Book it.