Charlie Coyle had zero points in the six games prior to Christmas break. Jake DeBrusk also had zero points during those six games, and he had gone 10 games without a goal. Brad Marchand had one goal and zero 5-on-5 points in the seven games leading up to the break.
They were not the only Bruins struggling as Boston limped into Christmas on a four-game losing streak, but they were perhaps the three forwards the team most needed to get going.
Apparently the solution was to just put the three of them together on a line and kill three birds with one stone. Marchand, Coyle and DeBrusk are all suddenly red-hot, with each of them recording four points in the Bruins' first two games post-Christmas, a 4-1 win over the Buffalo Sabres on Wednesday and a 5-2 win over the New Jersey Devils on Saturday.
It's not a completely new line combination. Jim Montgomery has tried a Marchand-Coyle-DeBrusk line several times this season. In fact, it was one of his opening night lines. But the results had been mixed, and they never seemed to last more than a few games together.
Marchand and Coyle, in particular, didn't exactly find immediate chemistry. In their 154 minutes together at 5-on-5 before Christmas, the Bruins were under 50% in shot attempts, scoring chances and expected goals. That wasn't totally surprising. While the two have been teammates since Coyle was acquired in 2019, they had rarely been linemates. Marchand, of course, almost always had Patrice Bergeron as his center.
"It's been different," Coyle acknowledged at Saturday's morning skate. "We haven't played a whole lot together over the years. You're still getting to know tendencies and how guys work. Yeah, I've watched him, and that's one thing, but when you're actually out there playing and reading off of guys, that's always a work in progress."
There's a reason Montgomery envisioned Marchand and Coyle together, though, and there's a reason he's repeatedly circled back to it.
"I really like Coyle-Marchy. It really gives me a shutdown line," he said this week.
That much has been true, even when they were struggling to score themselves. When it's been Marchand, Coyle and either DeBrusk, Danton Heinen or Trent Frederic on their right, the Bruins have surrendered just one goal in 149 minutes.
But, as one of the Bruins' top two lines, they also needed to score. That is where work needed to be done, and that's where progress is starting to be made.
"I think it's much better now than where it was at the beginning of the year," Marchand said of his chemistry with Coyle. "I think we're understanding how to play with each other more, which we knew would be the case. Any time you switch lines up, there's always – not always, but at times there's a feel-out period. I think we've found chemistry with guys in the past, and we're used to that, but I think we're feeling much more confident with one another, and it's showing."
And then there's DeBrusk. No Bruins forward needed to find his offensive game more than DeBrusk, who had just 11 points through his first 31 games this season. It looks like he might finally be finding it playing alongside Marchand and Coyle.
On Wednesday, DeBrusk registered his first multi-point game of the season, setting up Coyle for a pair of goals. On Saturday, he made it two in a row. With the Bruins trailing 2-0 in the second, DeBrusk started the comeback when he took a pass from Marchand, drove to the net, and finished with a pretty forehand-backhand move. Later in the period, he set up the go-ahead goal when he sprung Pastrnak for a power-play tally.
"It started in Buffalo [on Wednesday]," Montgomery said of DeBrusk's breakthrough. "You can tell his speed is very, very noticeable. When his speed is noticeable, you know he's on top of his game. And he's doing a lot of little, good things. That goal he scored is a goal-scorer's goal. Not a lot of people take that puck to the far post, because you have to have courage to do that. That's a brave play by him."
Like many of his teammates, DeBrusk used the three-day Christmas break as a chance to reset.
"I think we all did, to be honest. We didn't like how we came into the break," DeBrusk said. "But yeah, personally, I just got away from it, to be honest with you. I was watching Christmas movies and I was enjoying myself, so it was nice to be able to do that for a little bit. Obviously it's just three days, but that can make a world of difference."
Montgomery wanted Marchand and Coyle to work. Everyone wanted DeBrusk to score more. It's only been two games, and they'll obviously need to keep it rolling, but it looks like Montgomery might finally be getting what he expected when he put these three together to start the season.
