There is little to complain about when you’re riding a 10-game winning streak, cruising to the Presidents’ Trophy, and on pace to break the single-season points record.
For the Bruins, though, there is one area of their game that has been a bit concerning recently: The power play.
After an 0-for-3 showing against the Rangers on Saturday, the Boston power play is now 5-for-49 (10.2%) over the last 15 games. That ranks 29th in the NHL during that time and is way below the Bruins’ 23.2% mark for the season.
Coach Jim Montgomery said after Saturday’s game that he was getting close to trying different personnel on his top power-play unit. At Wednesday’s practice, he did just that.
When it came time for the power-play portion of practice, it was Dmitry Orlov running the point on the top unit, not Charlie McAvoy. McAvoy slid down to the second unit, playing the right elbow spot Orlov had been in, with Hampus Lindholm remaining the PP2 quarterback.
It is, of course, too simplistic to blame all of the top unit’s struggles on McAvoy, or to expect Orlov to singlehandedly fix everything. But this was always going to be the natural place to start for Montgomery, with David Pastrnak (left elbow), Brad Marchand (right elbow), Patrice Bergeron (bumper) and Jake DeBrusk (net-front) all more concretely locked into spots where they’ve had lots of success.
Montgomery explained why he decided to make the swap now.
“Our power play has kind of stalled. It’s been flat,” he said. “If you look at the Bergeron unit, they’ve scored two goals over the last [15 games], and only one goal was really an in-zone goal. It was DeBrusk’s first game back. So, we have the opportunity to experiment, and we’re experimenting.”
Power-play prowess wasn’t exactly why the Bruins acquired Orlov. General manager Don Sweeney traded for him two weeks ago because of everything else that he brings to the table. The Capitals barely used him on the power play in recent years.
But Orlov has shown some early promise on the Bruins’ second unit, setting up a Pavel Zacha goal in Calgary last Tuesday and then scoring one himself on a rocket one-timer against Buffalo on Thursday. His shot, in particular, could be a weapon, and one that McAvoy hasn’t yet mastered. Both of Orlov’s power-play points came while playing on the right elbow rather than at the center point spot, so that move to QB will be something a little new. Why not give it a shot, though?
“What we’ve seen from him is when it’s time to move it, he moves it, and when it’s time to shoot it, he shoots it,” Montgomery said of Orlov. “It was just, let’s give this a look. We don’t know if it’s gonna work.”
Montgomery also thinks that moving McAvoy to more of a wing role on the second unit and away from center point could help get him going, too.
“We’re also looking at, how does Charlie McAvoy have a lot of success? He has a lot of success attacking down the wing in the offensive zone,” Montgomery said. “…He’s a real dynamic player on the move, and we want to put him in situations to succeed and make us better. Ultimately it’s, how can we experiment to make the Bruins better?”
Montgomery could have given Hampus Lindholm another shot as the PP1 quarterback. That unit’s numbers with Lindholm there have been better than with McAvoy this season. In 55 minutes with McAvoy on the power play with Pastrnak, Bergeron, Marchand and DeBrusk, the Bruins have scored 10.94 goals per 60 minutes and 8.75 expected goals per 60. In 28 minutes with Lindholm there, they’ve jumped to 19.26 goals per 60 and 10.12 expected goals per 60.
Montgomery also could have taken another look at the five-forward unit with David Krejci running point. In the 19 minutes that group has played together, the Bruins have scored 12.45 goals per 60 and a whopping 20.1 expected goals per 60. However, that unit could also get pretty sloppy at times, and did give up a shorthanded goal in their short time together.
Both of those options could still be on the table if Orlov doesn’t work out, but for now, Montgomery has nothing to lose by giving Orlov a shot.
Regardless of who is quarterbacking the top unit, Marchand says the whole group is in need of more movement and more simplification.
“I think we just have to get back to some of the fine things, move it a little quicker,” Marchand said. “We’re trying to set up plays a little too much and getting away from the things that have given us success over the last number of years. We’ve had a recipe that has worked for our group, and we’re kind of getting away from it a little bit.
“Just trying to get back to the basics of what we do well. That’s moving it, attacking at the net, recovering pucks. That’s when we’re good, is when we recover an initial shot or attack and get it back and then start making plays when they’re out of position. We’ve never been a great stationary team, where we stand there and just make plays. So we just have to get back to playing the way we do.”
The Bruins will get their first look at whether Orlov can help with that when they host the Edmonton Oilers Thursday night.
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