The Bruins made their first round of cuts Thursday, announcing that the following eight players have been sent to AHL Providence training camp, which begins Monday:
Forwards: Joey Abate, Vincent Arseneau, Justin Brazeau, Curtis Hall, Owen Pederson, Luke Toporowski
Defense: Ethan Ritchie
Goalie: Shane Starrett
Did any Bruins make a positive impression in second preseason game?
None of those eight cuts are all that surprising. Toporowski was the only one who had maybe even an outside chance of competing for an opening night roster spot. He had a solid first pro season in Providence last year (29 points in 47 games) and drew praise from Bruins coach Jim Montgomery earlier in training camp for his finishing and willingness to go to dirty areas to score. Still, he was always a longshot.
Following this round of cuts, the Bruins still have 26 forwards, 17 defensemen and five goalies in camp. They will have to get down to a maximum of 23 players before opening night on Oct. 11.
Basically, this round of cuts just helped get the Bruins down to more manageable practice groups. On Thursday, they had two practice groups with each featuring 13 forwards and eight defensemen -- the exact size of a normal regular-season practice. Defenseman Jakub Zboril remains out of practice after suffering an undisclosed injury in Sunday's preseason game.
Here were the Bruins' practice lines and pairs Thursday, featuring the players still left in camp:
Group A
Anthony Richard - Pavel Zacha - David Pastrnak
Brad Marchand - Matthew Poitras - Danton Heinen
A.J. Greer - Marc McLaughlin/John Farinacci - Jakub Lauko
Brett Harrison - Georgii Merkulov - Alex Chiasson
Mason Lohrei - Charlie McAvoy
Hampus Lindholm - Kevin Shattenkirk
Derek Forbort - Dan Renouf
Parker Wotherspoon - Reilly Walsh
Linus Ullmark
Jeremy Swayman
Group B
James van Riemsdyk - Charlie Coyle - Jake DeBrusk
Jesper Boqvist - Morgan Geekie - Trent Frederic
Milan Lucic - Patrick Brown - Jayson Megna
Trevor Kuntar - Johnny Beecher - Oskar Steen/Fabian Lysell
Matt Grzelcyk - Brandon Carlo
Mike Callahan - Ian Mitchell
Frederic Brunet - Alec Regula
Jackson Edward - Ryan Mast
Brandon Bussi
Michael DiPietro
Kyle Keyser