The Boston Bruins officially reached the halfway point of the regular season with game No. 41 Saturday night. They’re not arriving on a high note, as they’ve now lost three in a row after falling to the Toronto Maple Leafs, 6-4.
After scoring just two goals total in their previous two games, the offense did come to life in this one with goals from David Pastrnak (x2), Morgan Geekie and Trent Frederic. Unfortunately, the defensive structure that they had been building abandoned them, with too many mistakes that a dangerous Leafs offense was able to capitalize on.
Elias Lindholm lost a board battle on Toronto’s first goal, Charlie McAvoy committed a bad turnover on the second, Brandon Carlo whiffed on both puck and body on the third, and a Nikita Zadorov turnover combined with a McAvoy lost battle to set up the fourth. The final two were empty-netters, with a Pastrnak extra-attacker goal sandwiched in between.
The Leafs’ top line of Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner and Matthew Knies did most of the damage, with Knies recording a hat trick and two assists, Marner notching five points of his own, and Matthews tallying a goal and two assists in his first game back after missing two weeks with an upper-body injury.
The Bruins finish the first half with a record of 20-17-4 (.537 points percentage), which puts them in fourth place in the Atlantic Division and seventh place in the Eastern Conference, making them the first wild card team just ahead of the Ottawa Senators.
The good news for the Bruins is that they get to start the second half right away, as they host the New York Islanders at 6 p.m. ET Sunday. Before the second half begins, here are our first-half grades for every Bruin who has played at least 10 games this season.
Forwards
Johnny Beecher: C
Beecher plays good 5-on-5 defense, which is essential for a fourth-liner. He’s won 56.2% of his faceoffs. He’s a big part of the penalty kill, but it’s hard to give out bonus points for that when the PK ranks 25th in the NHL. The biggest knock on Beecher, though, is the lack of offensive contributions. After a hot start (five points in the first five games), Beecher has gone 34 games without a goal, and has recorded just three assists during that time. That’s not good enough, regardless of what he brings defensively.
Justin Brazeau: B
After a strong finish to last season, Brazeau has answered any questions about whether it was a fluke by putting up nine goals and 17 points in 39 games. He’s tied for fourth on the team in goals and is just under a 20-goal pace for the season. He is consistently around the net in the offensive zone, scoring the kinds of goals this under-talented team needs more of. He is also tied with David Pastrnak for the team lead with four power-play goals. Brazeau is proving to be a solid third-liner who also didn’t look out of place when he was on the second line. Not bad at all for someone making the league minimum. After Mark Kastelic’s extension this week, we wonder if Brazeau could be next.
Charlie Coyle: D+
After a career-high 60 points last season, Coyle is on pace for less than half of that this year. His 10 goals do rank third on the team, but he has just four assists. The overall production just isn’t anywhere close to where it needs to be. Coyle started the season as the second-line center, but quickly got bumped down to the third line. He’s back up on the second line as a right wing now, which has freed him up a little bit. Maybe playing there will get his season turned around. The Bruins could use it.
Trent Frederic: D-
Our lowest grade here, which shouldn’t be surprising. Frederic has been a massive disappointment this season, with just six goals and six assists through 40 games. After a career-high 40 points last year, he is on pace for 24. His defensive play has also fallen off, as he is a minus-6 at 5-on-5, second-worst on the team behind only Mason Lohrei. Frederic hasn’t made enough of an impact physically night-in, night-out either. But it does need to be noted that he has played better this past week, and he did score on Saturday with a nice finish against childhood friend Joseph Woll. It was his first goal and point in 12 games, but maybe this could be the start of a turnaround. A pending free agent, Frederic has been a frequent subject of trade rumors, and that will likely continue.
Morgan Geekie: B-
After a horrible start to the season, Geekie has turned things around nicely and earned the top-six spot that he squandered away early on. With another goal Saturday, he now has eight goals and 13 points in his last 18 games, which would put him at a 36-goal pace over 82 games. At times he has been the Bruins’ best forward recently, frequently forcing turnovers and winning battles with good checking and second and third efforts. Boston would be happy to keep this version of Geekie around beyond this season as he approaches restricted free agency.
Mark Kastelic: B-
Kastelic has fit like a glove in his first season in Boston, and now has a new three-year extension to show for it. He is the team’s physical tone-setter most nights, with a team-leading 154 hits and six fighting majors, both of which rank second in the NHL. He’s also playing good defense and winning 54.9% of his faceoffs, and he has already matched his career high in points with 11. The Bruins would like to see the offense start to tick up again, though, as he has one point in the last 12 games.
Cole Koepke: C+
Most people, myself included, didn’t even expect Koepke to make the team. He did, and then he came flying out of the gates with six points in the first six games. His speed, physicality and defensive smarts make him a good fourth-liner, and his six goals are tied for eighth on the team. As is the case with the rest of the fourth line, though, the Bruins are hoping to see at least some of the offense resurface; Koepke has one point in the last 14 games.
Elias Lindholm: C-
Lindholm is on pace for 14 goals and 40 points, which isn’t nearly good enough for someone making $7.75 million. Yes, he contributes in other ways. He plays good defense. He wins 55.2% of his faceoffs. He plays in all situations. He wins a lot of battles and plays with more physicality than he probably gets credit for. But the Bruins also need him to produce more offensively, plain and simple.
Brad Marchand: B+
The captain gets the best grade in the class. Marchand got off to a slow start while recovering from three offseason surgeries, but has looked much more like himself over the last month and a half. He has 18 points in the last 21 games and is tied for the team lead with 15 goals. It’s not quite prime Marchand, but it’s also not reasonable to expect that at age 36. His effort is always there, and in that respect he remains the standard for the rest of the team to match. Marchand might have a case for an ‘A’ if the power play was better. That’s not his problem alone to solve, but he has been part of the struggling top unit all season, and often gets caught holding on to the puck too long.
Marc McLaughlin: C/Incomplete
McLaughlin has only played 11 games, hence the incomplete part of this grade. But when he’s played, he’s done his job as a fourth-line winger, playing good defense and chipping in two goals. As Joe Sacco put it recently, McLaughlin is “reliable.” That earned him a longer stay in Boston, with the Bruins electing to keep him with the big club rather than send him back to Providence before he would need to clear waivers again.
David Pastrnak: B-
Pastrnak is once again the Bruins’ leading scorer with 40 points in 41 games, but a 30-goal, 80-point pace isn’t good enough for him. Maybe it’s unfair how reliant this team is on Pastrnak for offense, but the reality is that they are. And in order to even be a middle-of-the-pack offense, they need Pastrnak to be closer to the 110-point player of the last couple years. He does still lead the NHL in shots, and at some point his career-worst shooting percentage will rise, and the numbers will look better. Maybe Saturday’s two goals on five shots will be the start of that turnaround, but he also needs to create better luck by working for better looks, an issue we highlighted this past week.
Matt Poitras: C+/Incomplete
Poitras was playing fairly well through 14 games before being sent down to Providence, but it’s not like he was lighting it up. He had one goal and three assists. He has been lighting it up in the AHL, though, with 15 points in his last 13 games, while playing more minutes and in more situations. It will be interesting to see how Poitras looks once he’s back in Boston, whenever that is.
Pavel Zacha: C+
Another forward who just isn’t producing at the level the Bruins need. After putting up 57 and then 59 points in his first two seasons in Boston, Zacha is on pace for 40 this year. He has picked it up since Thanksgiving, though, with 13 points in 18 games, and he’s done a decent job sliding back to first-line center after starting the season on the wing. His line with Pastrnak and Geekie has a 54.3% expected goals share in 236 5-on-5 minutes together, and he deserves at least some credit for that. We know from last year that’s not the ideal role for Zacha, but Coyle’s struggles and Lindholm’s lack of chemistry with Pastrnak necessitated using Zacha there.
Defense
Brandon Carlo: D+
We know what Carlo’s job is: Shutdown defenseman, tasked with tough matchups, lots of defensive-zone shifts, and heavy penalty-killing minutes. Unfortunately, Carlo isn’t doing that job as well as he has in previous seasons. At 5-on-5, he’s been on the ice for more goals against per 60 minutes than any of the previous three seasons. Among Bruins defensemen, he’s been on the ice for the second-most scoring chances and high-danger chances against. And the penalty kill ranks 25th in the NHL, so no bonus points there. Carlo brings little to the table offensively, so the defense really has to be better than it’s been. The eventual return of Hampus Lindholm, his usual D partner, will certainly help.
Hampus Lindholm: B/Incomplete
Lindholm was playing very well and was arguably the Bruins’ best player through 17 games before suffering a knee injury on Nov. 12. He still has not started skating, although Sacco did say this week that he’s close to getting back on the ice. Lindholm will be a big help whenever he does return. He’ll add more offense from the back end, he could help both the power play and the penalty kill, and he’ll definitely help out Carlo at 5-on-5.
Mason Lohrei: C-
The good news: Lohrei is third on the Bruins in assists (15) and first in power-play assists (7). With Lindholm out, he is one of two Bruins defensemen (along with Charlie McAvoy) who can actually help create offense. The bad news: the 23-year-old Lohrei is still a defensive liability. At 5-on-5, he has been on the ice for the most goals, scoring chances and high-danger chances against per 60 minutes on the team. He has the worst 5-on-5 goal differential at minus-7. The Bruins still need Lohrei to get stiffer in his own zone, and they need him to cut down on the poor decisions at the offensive blue line like the ones that led to two odd-man rushes in New York Thursday night.
Charlie McAvoy: B-
McAvoy is having a good season 5-on-5, Saturday’s two costly mistakes notwithstanding. He’s a plus-4, which is tied for second-best on the team. He helps drive play at both ends of the ice and helps set the tone physically, and he’s doing it without a consistent, locked-in partner next to him. He was with Nikita Zadorov to start the season and is again now, but we’ve also seen McAvoy line up next to Jordan Oesterle, Mason Lohrei and (before his injury) Hampus Lindholm at various points this season. The one big mark against McAvoy is, of course, the power play. He is far from the only reason the Bruins rank 31st, but he is part of the problem. He simply has not done a good enough job quarterbacking the top unit, with slow puck movement and indecisive shot selection still too common.
Jordan Oesterle: C+
The 32-year-old Oesterle started the season in Providence, but has proven to be a valuable veteran fill-in since getting called up in mid-November. He has paired with both McAvoy and Carlo in the top four with Lindholm out, and has held his own with some steady defense and efficient puck movement in transition. Oesterle is one of three Bruins defensemen (with McAvoy and Lindholm) who has a positive goal differential at 5-on-5 (+2), and he has an expected goals share of 55.6%.
Andrew Peeke: C
Sacco recently described Peeke as a “steady” player who “defends hard” and “keeps his game simple.” And yeah, that pretty much sums it up perfectly. He’s been tasked with being Lohrei’s security blanket for much of the season, and has mostly played that role well, although that pairing is still a minus-1 with a 45.5% Corsi in 236 minutes together. Peeke has had better results when he’s been paired with Zadorov, as they’re a plus-2 with a 55.5% Corsi in 178 minutes together while also getting a lot more defensive-zone starts than Lohrei-Peeke does. Peeke adds little offensively and has still not scored a goal in 56 games as a Bruin.
Parker Wotherspoon: C
Like Oesterle, Wotherspoon has done an admirable job on fill-in duty when called upon. On a per-60 basis at 5-on-5, he has been on the ice for the fewest goals, expected goals and high-danger chances against of any Bruins defenseman. Statistically, he has been the best non-Lindholm partner for Carlo, as they are a plus-3 in 118 minutes together with an expected goals share of 54.7%. Like Peeke, you get pretty much nothing offensively here (1 point in 19 games to be exact), but the Bruins will take the reliable defense from their seventh or eighth D.
Nikita Zadorov: C-
Zadorov has found his level a bit over the last month after a rough start to his time in Boston, but overall he still hasn’t done enough to justify his $5 million salary. His best spot has been on the third pairing with Peeke, but the Bruins’ roster construction kind of requires Sacco to keep moving him back up to the top pairing with McAvoy until or unless Lohrei proves capable of winning that job. The Zadorov-McAvoy pair has produced mixed results, sitting at plus-1 with a 48.8% Corsi in 316 minutes together. Zadorov gets a lot of PK time, but again, that’s not helping anyone’s grade given that unit’s struggles (although Zadorov does grade out as one of Boston’s better killers analytically). He also still leads the NHL in minor penalties taken.
Goalies
Joonas Korpisalo: C+
Korpisalo got off to a very good start this season and was straight-up outplaying Jeremy Swayman for a while, but he’s hit a little bit of a rough patch recently, allowing 11 goals in his last three starts with an .849 save percentage in that time. Overall, he’s now 7-4-1 with an .895 save percentage and 2.71 goals-against average. It’s not an easy role with such infrequent playing time, as the Bruins are generally giving Swayman three or four straight starts, meaning Korpisalo only gets in once every 7-10 days. We’ve advocated for something closer to a 2-1-2-1 rotation, but that doesn’t seem to be in the cards.
Jeremy Swayman: D
Swayman has picked it up a bit since that eight-goal embarrassment in Winnipeg last month, as he had gone seven straight starts without allowing more than three goals before surrendering four on Saturday. He has a .910 save percentage during that time. There are still a few too many shaky moments, though, like his careless giveaway that led to the Rangers’ first goal on Thursday. And the overall numbers are still bad. He is now 13-13-3 with an .891 save percentage and 2.91 GAA on the season. Among 60 goalies who have played at least 10 games, MoneyPuck had him 50th in goals saved above expected entering Saturday at minus-5.9. He ranks 56th in high-danger save percentage at .750. These last few weeks could be a start for Swayman, but the Bruins will need their $8.25 million man to pick it up even more in the second half.