Bruins
The excellent news? The Bruins have received loads of scoring opportunities from their fourth line within the 2024-25 season.
The high-motor trio of Mark Kastleic, Johnny Beecher and Cole Koepke have already scored 13 points together in 4 games.
The bad news? Boston's control unit is just about the one segment of the team's forward corps that gets shots on the scoresheet – especially at 5-on-5.
After Boston's fourth line, the Bruins' leading 5-on-5 scorer to this point this 12 months is … defenseman Brandon Carlo (three 5-on-5 points).
Elsewhere, a top line of David Pastrnak, Pavel Zacha and Elias Lindholm have combined for just five 5-on-5 points this 12 months. Their top-six counterparts Brad Marchand, Charlie Coyle and Morgan Geekie have zero 5-on-5 points.
With little likelihood of the Kastelic line maintaining this current point surge, Boston will soon need more from its big guns.
Jim Montgomery's first contingency plan was often to shuffle the lines when the 5-on-5 rating slowed down – as evidenced by Coyle and Geekie moving to the third line together with Trent Frederic in Monday's loss to the Panthers were pushed.
But on Tuesday, Montgomery emphasized that no amount of lineup adjustments will fix Boston's current problems if the general level of competition on the depth chart holds up from Monday's display.
“At the moment it's the level of performance, the consistency of our performance level – especially the chemistry – that hurts. And that really impacts execution,” noted Boston’s banking chief.
Montgomery's sentiment can be reflected in an influence play that has done little to shore up the Bruins' unbalanced offense to this point this fall.
Boston has capitalized on its 18 power play opportunities just twice this season (11.1 percent), while also giving up two shorthanded goals to Florida's Sam Reinhart in those 4 games.
Aside from the shortage of pucks hitting the online, Boston's man advantage also struggles in the case of generating any good probabilities in any respect.
While Boston has had 31:20 power play reps to this point this 12 months, the Bruins have only created eight dangerous scoring probabilities (per NaturalStatTrick)while he fired 4 times at the opposite end of the ice.
At times there have been encouraging scenes for Boston's power play, whether it was Elias Lindholm moving the puck up the slot from the “bumper” position or a defenseman like Charlie McAvoy lighting the lamp with a pointy wrister from the high slot.
But those sequences have often been rare this season as Boston has been unable to generate consistent O-zone time while skating, limiting the variety of probabilities stars like Pastrnak and Marchand can generate. restricted.
“We have to be a little stronger in the fights,” Marchand said Monday. “We have to outnumber the teams. Sometimes you simplify. You have to be numerically superior in the fights and find pucks. We didn’t think them up enough.”
Despite relying largely on their fourth line on offense, the Bruins still rank eighth within the NHL in goals per game (3.75). Boston has benefited from some unexpected contributions in the primary week of a brand new season, but Pastrnak believes it's only a matter of time before the remaining of the Bruins' forwards start pulling the rope.
“Probably the only disappointment is that we know we're a much better team than we've shown so far,” Pastrnak said. “It’s definitely frustrating because we know we can do a lot better. … I would say healthy frustration just because we know we can be a lot better than we've shown.”
Pastrnak has no problem with the Panthers' scoring
The Bruins were stunned Monday after Panthers forward AJ Greer's hit from behind on Pastrnak went unpunished.
But Boston's star winger didn't have much trouble with the sport when asked about it on Tuesday.
“The hit, I don’t think much of it,” Pastrnak said. “It was from behind. I have not seen anything. I didn't see the replay, but it came from behind, a normal hit. I would say I was just unlucky. I caught the visor and somehow hit myself in the mouth [Jesper] Boqvist’s skate, so I was unlucky.”
Pastrnak, who had a cut on his upper lip on account of the contract with Boqvist's skate, as a substitute echoed a few of Montgomery's postgame thoughts on Monday — particularly in selecting the best response against a team like Florida.
“I have no problem with being hunted as long as it follows the rules and clean hits are made,” Pastrnak said. “I can take that. I have no problem. I can make a hit. No problem with a clean hit. So we definitely have to draw the line at when it's a bad game to give an answer.
“There will be opportunities for that. For some it's just a clean hit, and that's hockey. You have to take it. It's a tough sport, so if you can't stand it, you shouldn't be in the league. So we definitely have to take time and space into account when answering these questions.”
Breather for Marchand
Brad Marchand didn’t participate in training on Tuesday, Montgomery described it as a “maintenance day” … Tyler Johnson, still with out a contract, was on the ice in Brighton as a participant. The 34-year-old veteran was brought into camp on a PTO (Professional Tryout) contract and impressed in the course of the preseason.
Last week, Montgomery admitted that Johnson was “being patient and staying for now” as Boston needed to create some respiration room if Johnson desired to sign an NHL contract. According to PuckPediaThe Bruins currently only have $406,117 in cap space.
image credit : www.boston.com