The last time that Matt Grzelcyk lit the lamp twice on TD Garden ice — the Charlestown native felt part of a childhood dream realized.
The date was February 23, 2015, and the then-junior at BU had just captained the Terriers to their first Beanpot title in six years. The 21-year-old defenseman provided the heroics in what was a 4-3 victory over Northeastern, scoring his second goal of the night just 51 seconds into overtime to bring the storied trophy back to Commonwealth Ave.
The story pretty much wrote itself. A local kid // drafted by the Bruins // playing for a local college // scoring the game-winner for his team.
Grzelcyk and his family’s roots have been well-documented, as his father, John, has served as a member of the TD Garden “bull gang” for decades. Since that night in February, the puck Grzelcyk uncorked into the Huskies’ net has adorned a spot on the mantelpiece at the Grzelcyk family’s home — just a stone’s throw away from the Garden.
"It's obviously a dream living so close to the Garden and my dad working here,” Grzelcyk said following the Terriers victory. “Still hasn’t really set in. We were really confident, just wanted to make sure we had fun because you never know if you're going to come back here.”
Sure enough, the Terriers have yet to take home another Beanpot since the winter of 2015. As for Grzelcyk? Well, he has his sights set on a shinier piece of hardware these days.
The next time Grzelcyk tallied a pair of goals at TD Garden — Sunday evening, Mother’s Day, Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals.
It stood as the first time since 2011 that a Bruins’ defenseman tallied multiple goals in a playoff game, with Grzelcyk standing as just one of five B’s blueliners to accomplish the feat in the last 35 years.
Now in his second full NHL campaign, the 25-year-old has emerged as one of the catalysts on a dynamic Bruins D corps that — if you discount 42-year-old
Zdeno Chara
— has an average age of 23.6.
“I’ve been one of Grizz’ biggest fans since he came in the league,”
Torey Krug
said. “We joke about it all the time now that we have a couple of guys under 5-10 winning games in the National Hockey League and three defensemen under 6 foot, so we’re causing havoc and doing the job.”
Potting a pair of goals past Carolina’s
Petr Mrazek
might have been the highlight of a 6-2 shellacking carried out by the Bruins on home ice, but it’d be a disservice to say that Grzelcyk’s offensive outburst was simply a flash in the pan.
After all, Grzelcyk is averaging 17:24 of ice time over a 15-game stretch, while also chipping in with three goals and seven total points. Not bad for a 5-foot-9 defenseman.
Grzelcyk’s quick feet and on-ice awareness have allowed him to
but his smaller frame didn’t do him any favors in the opening minutes of Sunday’s contest — as he was steamrolled by Canes bruiser
Micheal Ferland
right in front of Boston’s bench.
He didn’t seem all too worse for wear later in the first stanza, as Grzelcyk opened the scoring at 15:22 — snapping in a shot that tucked itself through Mrazek’s arm and into the back of the net to jolt the Garden crowd.
Even with Grzelcyk small stature and Ferland’s … well, not small stature,
Charlie McAvoy
had little doubt that his former teammate at BU was going to be down for the count.
“Aw man, he’s a gamer,” McAvoy said. “So he’s going to get hit like that and we had no doubt he was going to come back and play his game – he always does. He’s a rock for us and he played awesome tonight. I couldn’t be happier for him to break through and get a couple.”
Grzelcyk was one of 11 different B’s players to record at least a point in Sunday’s win — while 19 total Bruins skaters have found the back of the net so far during this playoff run.
Of that 19, four of them have New England roots in Grzelcyk,
Charlie Coyle
Chris Wagner
and
Noel Acciari
The local guys might be a vocal (based on the chorus of cheers at TD Garden) minority in Boston’s locker room, but even Krug — a native of Livonia, Mich. — can appreciate the role that those four have in forging an identity that goes beyond the on-ice product.
“The mayor of Charlestown is sitting next to me,” Krug joked as he sat next to Grzelcyk. “That’s important to our team. I think guys that take a lot of pride putting the sweater on with the spoked B, I think no one takes it for granted that’s for sure. As a whole, as a group, we’re very prideful.
“When you have local guys coming in and doing it, having the success that they’ve had, it’s a special feeling for them I’m sure and we all get a little bit of energy off of it.”
Fair to say, a lot has changed in the four years since Grzelcyk’s Beanpot heroics — with the undersized skater going from midseason depth call-up last year into being one of the linchpins on a B’s club inching closer and closer to a Cup final.
Still, amid the fracas and distractions that come with a championship run, Grzelcyk finds the time to parse through the noise and reflect on the road he’s followed on the way to a starting role in the NHL.
Most of it wouldn’t be possible without his parents — with both his father and mother, Kathleen, in attendance for Sunday’s Mother's Day matinee.
“She means the world. She’s someone that I talk to every single day and probably my best friend,” Grzelcyk said of his mother. “Her and my dad obviously mean a lot to me and I wouldn’t be in this position without them and it’s great to share this experience with my family and friends.
“Getting the win in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals, you don’t want to allow yourself to kind of sit back and relax and think too much about it, but honestly it’s really special right now and it’s fun to ride this one out and go into Game 3 and have another strong effort.”
John Grzelcyk is usually overseeing some major alterations to the TD Garden floor — whether it be switching from ice to parquet, vice versa and much more.
A few similar adjustments have taken place at the Grzelcyk home, although on a far smaller scale.
On the mantelpiece where that puck from the 2015 Beanpot stands, there’s now a bit of company. Next to it lies the biscuit Matt scored for his career NHL goal, back on Nov. 24, 2017.
But there’s always room for a couple more. And with just six wins separating the Bruins from a Stanley Cup, Grzelcyk will be ready to set some space for the next prize from his son’s storybook run with his hometown team.
