Boston Bruins team preview: Is a winning window still open?

A long-standing Stanley Cup contender, the Boston Bruins had their streak of eight consecutive playoff seasons snapped in 2024-25 as the team turned into a seller attempting to rebuild on the fly.

The first rough patch happened right away. Boston won just two of its first eight games, and before November was over, the front office fired head coach Jim Montgomery. An 11-4-1 start under replacement Joe Sacco gave hope that the Bruins would recover from their slow start, but that optimism was short-lived. They won just one of their first eight games after the Christmas break and attention turned to who they might move out by March’s trade deadline.

This culminated in the unthinkable: Brad Marchand being traded out of Boston, the last remaining member of the 2011 Stanley Cup-winning team and one of the final members of the 2019 team that reached the final.

Boston’s season ended with a thud as it sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Division and tied with Philadelphia in points as the worst team in the Eastern Conference. However, this doesn’t mean the Bruins have resigned themselves to a long-term rebuild. David Pastrnak, Charlie McAvoy and Jeremy Swayman — key players at their positions while still in their prime years — are all signed to long-term deals and the front office went to work over the summer trying to make the team harder to play against.

Next up in our preview of the 32 NHL teams over 32 days are the Boston Bruins, who enter the season as a bit of a mystery.

Bruins GM Don Sweeney remarked at the end of 2024-25 that too often his team was an easy out, so the summer was spent trying to address that concern. Jeannot was top-25 in the league in hits last season and is sixth in hits since 2021-22, so there’s no doubt he’ll bring the sandpaper Boston is seeking. But can he add goal scoring as well? Jeannot scored 24 goals for Nashville in 2021-22, but has scored 20 goals total in the three years since. Pastrnak and Morgan Geekie are the only players on this roster who reached the 20-goal plateau last season, so offence could be a team weakness. Jeannot getting back to 20 might be a stretch — he had a 19.4 shooting percentage the season he did it — but even getting back to the double digits would be a win for Boston.

Blumel is a player to watch at Bruins training camp. When he signed with the team on July 1, it appeared there would be a wide-open lane to an NHL roster spot, but the Bruins went on to sign other players with more NHL experience, so the depth chart is far more crowded today. Still, Blumel led the AHL with 39 goals last season and finished top-five the year before. As it seems like the Bruins might struggle to put the puck in the net, Blumel, a 25-year-old on a one-year contract, is worth rolling the dice on. If he doesn’t earn a roster spot out of camp, he’ll probably be a quick call up if Boston starts slow and isn’t scoring enough.

Top Prospect: James Hagens

The upside to finishing so low in the standings is that Boston was able to make a draft pick inside the top 10 for the first time since 2011. And with the seventh-overall selection, it nabbed James Hagens from its backyard out of Boston College. Hagens is a great pick for a team in need of centres with some offensive pop in the system. He began last hockey season ranked No. 1 on most draft lists, and though he did fall a few spots by the end of it, our scout Jason Bukala wrote that wasn’t because Hagens himself fell off, it was more because of how the players around him performed. Bukala slotted Hagens fourth overall in his final ranking, so the Bruins got a steal at No. 7. However, Hagens won’t be a factor to start Boston’s season. He’ll head back to college, but depending on how early the Eagles‘ season ends, Hagens may be in consideration for a late-season signing and call-up.

1. Can Jeremy Swayman bounce all the way back without pre-season distractions?

A drawn-out contract negotiation last season that was dragged through the media wasn’t resolved until Oct. 6, after training camp and pre-season had concluded. Four days later, Swayman started Boston’s home opener. He never settled in after the late start and in his first full season as the Bruins‘ undisputed No. 1, he finished with a career-worst 3.11 GAA and .892 save percentage. At $8.25 million, Swayman is one of the league’s highest-paid goalies and he’s under contract for another seven years. When Linus Ullmark was around, Swayman’s high of games played was 44, but he played in 58 games in 2024-25. Still having to prove he can excel with a heavier workload, Swayman will have much more runway to get prepared with the team this season. Boston’s bounce back is heavily reliant on Swayman lifting the Bruins up.

2. How big of a boost will a healthy Charlie McAvoy and Hampus Lindholm be?

Boston’s No. 1 defenceman and a menace all over the ice, McAvoy’s season ended with a shoulder injury and infection at the 4 Nations. That came months after Hampus Lindholm sustained a knee injury in November that kept him out for the remainder of the season. With two of the team’s most leaned-upon defencemen out, Boston’s back end imploded. Both are expected back for the start of training camp and could make up the Bruins‘ top defence pair (or, at least, both will be in the top four). If the Bruins are going to find their way back toward the playoffs, it will depend on great goaltending and a defensive commitment and identity through the lineup. The culture and leadership will rely on these two defencemen carrying their weight and then some, to set the tone for the rest of the team. Still, these are shoulder and knee injuries the players are coming back from, so can they be at peak performance right away?

3. How will Marco Sturm do in his first year as an NHL head coach?

A former Bruins player, Sturm has served as a coach on an NHL bench before, as an assistant in Los Angeles for four years. His past three have been spent as the head coach in the AHL with the Kings‘ affiliate, where he got to the second round once (and lost). As the Bruins look to turn around the misfortunes of 2024-25, the responsibility falls on a first-time NHL head coach to lead the charge, and the odds are stacked against him. It might be obvious, but even Sturm admitted these Bruins won’t be able to hang with the top teams in the Atlantic Division on skill alone, and have to find a way to will wins through grit, defence and determination. Success here will be determined by structure and the level of buy-in from the players, and it’s Sturm’s job to squeeze every ounce of that out of this roster.