By: Declan Flavin | Follow me on Twitter / X @FlavinDeclan
With the Boston Bruins continuing to build on valuable lessons throughout this regular season, even as another New England team makes a playoff run, it’s worth noting how this hockey team is positioning itself for sustained success moving forward. The potential for success will ironically rely on the aspiring identity brought by head coach Marco Sturm mixed with the fatal infusion of young talent set to reach the National Hockey League in the coming years.
No one can manufacture a competitive multi-year run solely through the aid of predetermined draft picks, but the truth is that the young talent waiting in the wings for the Bruins is the result of valued prospects falling to them through both the draft and trade situations. Every team, regardless of sport, needs good fortune in roster building just as much as execution on the field, and this feels like another moment where a franchise is due to put the pieces together again.
Culture + Prospects
With the alignment between the new coaching regime and the front office around a more downhill, physical forechecking style, the foundation has been laid for when the youth pipeline begins to burst. This will allow established, extended players like David Pastrnak and Morgan Geekie to pave the way for the skill the prospects will bring, creating offensive support that allows every player to improve.
As our own Eamonn McLean and Neil Simmons have highlighted with the team’s youth pipeline, Will Zellers, Dean Letourneau, and James Hagens have emerged as the franchise’s quasi-big three. All three have had slightly different paths through their development: Zellers was overlooked by the Colorado Avalanche in part due to his size; Letourneau was overlooked mostly because of his raw 6’7” frame; and Hagens entered as a high pick but eventually projected lower due to the rise of other prospects, even though he was considered a near-guarantee for whoever drafted him.
The background with Hagens, who fittingly wears number 10 for the Boston College Eagles, sounds awfully similar to one at a recent draft for another New England team, doesn’t it? Regardless, there have clearly been seemingly promising prospect comparisons like these that have trended in the opposite direction for other teams as well.
The point is that the Bruins’ organization even have locally recognizable crossroads in front of them. Why not follow along and see what this could look like on the ice sooner rather than later?
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