In a way, I don’t want to be too down on the Boston Bruins. Yeah, they have dropped two straight games and are sitting at 2-2-0 through their first four games of the new season. The good vibes of starting the year with back-to-back wins were flushed out pretty quickly by Quinn Hughes and the Wild and Tim Stützle’s continued domination over the Bruins just two nights later.
But in the same breath, sitting at .500 without No. 1 defenseman Charlie McAvoy (suspended for the first six games of the season) is probably what we should’ve expected.
We all came into the year talking about what the Bruins had on defense, and how the numbers game was setting them up to have strong depth at the position. Bruins general manager Don Sweeney even went as far as to say that he would not apologize for the depth he amassed at the position after waiving Henri Jokiharju (448 NHL games) and Jordan Harris (172 NHL games) down to Providence at the end of training camp.
But let’s not confuse depth with high-end talent.
Through four games, Boston’s power play sits at 0-for-10. On their top unit, they’ve tried Hampus Lindholm, Mason Lohrei, and even Frederic Brunet in what is normally McAvoy’s spot as the quarterback. You can argue it’s officially going in the wrong direction,too, with one (but really two) shorthanded goals against in Monday’s loss.
“Lack of confidence, definitely,” David Pastrnak said of the power-play woes. “Puck is bouncing whether it’s with the hands of confidence. We have to be more direct, we have to recover pucks. We are one and done. A lot has to do with confidence and we just have to find it. We proved we could be a good power play last season.”
But the absence of McAvoy also extends beyond just the power play. When looking at the Bruins’ two losses this year, it’s been that team’s top talents that have burned ’em again and again. Those are McAvoy’s assignments most nights. Or, at the very least, it’s not something shouldered solely by the Nikita Zadorov-Connor Clifton pairing.
There’s balance with McAvoy in there that the Bruins simply can’t have right now. But the good news is that they’ll have to soldier on without him for just two more games.
Here are some other big-picture thoughts through four games of the new season…
Swayman picking up where he left off
One of the bigger questions facing the Bruins entering the 2026-27 season, and whether or not they could build off what they did a year ago, was if Jeremy Swayman could keep it up or not.
And while it’s early, Swayman is giving us no reason to doubt that he can do it again.
Swayman was sensational on Opening Night, and refused to let things slip away on the way to a comeback win in Winnipeg last weekend. Monday’s loss was a step backwards, sure, but the Bruins were quick to point out that they left their franchise netminder out to dry in that one.
“Sway can only stop so many breakaways and two-on-ones,” Zadorov said.
Bruins head coach Marco Sturm wants to get his house in order and a lot of that does begin in the defensive zone. You have to almost assume that things will get better on that front once he’s working with his full deck, as mentioned above. But Swayman has delivered when it comes to making the “high-danger” saves at the same clip he did a year ago, and that development is simply gigantic.
So much of the ‘regression’ talk surrounding the Bruins came back to the ability to score the goals they did a year ago and make the saves they did a year ago. Their ability to accomplish the former remains up in the air, but Swayman is putting the latter to rest early here.
The bonus here? Swayman’s new backup, Michael DiPietro, did not look completely out of place in his start against the Wild last Saturday. Not exactly an easy opponent, by the way.
Peterka just what Bruins offense needed
The Bruins’ lack of foot speed and dynamic, game-breaking ability was downright glaring in their first-round series with the Sabres last spring. So much so that the Bruins went outside the organization to address that need, adding JJ Peterka from the Mammoth in exchange for a pair of first-round draft picks.
To some, it seemed like a high price to pay for a player coming off a ‘bad fit’ kind of year in Utah. But in Boston, Peterka is looking like the exact player the Bruins needed to inject some life into their top six.
His speed and skill pops off the page, and he’s proven to be a decent fit with David Pastrnak.
I mean, let’s just look at his two goals in a Bruins uniform thus far. The Bruins didn’t have a single player a year ago who could’ve made his goal against the Rangers’ Igor Shesterkin look as easy as he did. And they did not have a player who could have that neutral-zone acceleration and that poise on the finish that he had in his overtime goal on the Jets’ Stuart Skinner last Friday.
Lindholm problem only getting worse for Bruins
The Bruins, for some insane reason, began the year with Elias Lindholm as their top-line center. Perhaps they felt that the third time would be the charm for Lindholm, who has been a highly ineffective scoring threat despite skating with one of the top-10 players in hockey in Pastrnak. But it once again has not worked as it should, and it’s officially hit “bashing your own head off the wall” levels.
If you’re the Bruins, you simply can’t keep shaking things up and keeping this guy in a top-line or top power-play role and expect anything to change for the better. He has these spurts where the details and battles are really good for a game or two, and maybe there’s some production to go along with it.
But he’s proven unable to sustain it for anything outside of those short bursts.
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