While there was a lot of talk about the Boston Bruins still looking for a bona fide frontline, No. 1 center three years after the retirement of Patrice Bergeron, that is not the biggest need for the B’s headed into the offseason.
Instead, the Bruins need to focus their efforts on improving their back end after finishing middle of the pack in the NHL defensively during the regular season, and proving to be a hockey club in the playoffs that was not adept at breaking the puck out against the speedy pressure from the Buffalo Sabres in the postseason.
Certainly, they weren’t pulling any punches about it on the NHL Network during the first-round playoff series.
@LindsayBHockey on NHL Network: "Boston is not a good puck-moving team from the back end. You could see how dominant Buffalo's forechecking was...Boston has a tough time defending. They are the worst breakout team in the NHL, by far. Their D-men are not adept at moving the puck"
— Joe Haggerty (@HackswithHaggs) April 20, 2026
Guys like minor league find Jonathan Aspirot, still-developing Mason Lohrei, and outgoing free agent Andrew Peeke were thrown into top 4 duty last season with varying results, but none of them felt like the long-term answer in that spot if the Bruins hope to build back into being a Stanley Cup contender.
From a short-term perspective, the Bruins are also going to need another top 4 defenseman-type at the start of the regular season now that Charlie McAvoy is facing a six-game suspension for his overhand, two-handed slash on Zach Benson at the end of their first-round playoff series. It was an ill-conceived move by McAvoy in terms of timing and long-term negative impact for the team, but the suspension is now in the books and the Bruins D-man’s window for appealing the decision with the league has expired as of this weekend.
Don Sweeney admitted at the end-of-season press conference that there are going to be “tweaks” to Marco Sturm’s man-to-man hybrid defensive zone coverage, and that the Bruins are more likely to mix in an aggressive forecheck with the neutral zone trap they employed at times last season. Essentially, the foundation has been laid for some significant philosophical changes the B’s made to their mindset in the D-zone and neutral zone last season, and now they can build on that beginning with training camp next season.
“You have to be able to defend, you've got to check up ice, you have to defend the neutral zone…the line rush side of things. We just made some decisions that we were going to counteract. We're going to make it awfully difficult for teams to get through the neutral zone,” said Sweeney. “But the breakouts are part of that. If we're not clean or coming out of our own end, you're going to get secondary chances and offensive zone time that's going to turn into breakdowns, mistakes or skilled players in this league will take advantage of space. So it's a combination of all of the above.
“Marco [Sturm] identified the players that certainly fit his eye in playing a system, but he’s also all into, it's not a full man-on-man as people describe. There's a hybrid approach to things [in the D-zone], the neutral zone and being able to probably flip it around as we did in Game 5 [of the playoffs] to have a little more of an attack mentality. You just have to be built to be able to do that, and we have to deepen our skill set and our speed to be able to allow a coach to do that.”
The Bruins attempted to keep that skill set and their speed moving the puck when they attempted to trade for Swedish defenseman Rasmus Andersson ahead of the NHL trade deadline in a deal that reportedly had Lohrei, Matt Poitras and a first-round pick headed to Calgary. Now Andersson is moving toward unrestricted free agency on July 1 after posting seven goals and 17 points in 33 games for Vegas while averaging 21:41 of ice time, and a playoff where he’s been mostly quiet offensively while averaging over 23 minutes of ice time per game and playing with a positive plus/minus for a team headed to the Western Conference Finals.
There’s also 30-year-old Darren Raddysh coming off the best NHL season of his career with 22 goals and 70 points on the back end. He’s not a slick puck mover, but he is a guy with a howitzer shot that plays big-time minutes after leading the Bolts with over 26 minutes of ice time per game during their playoff series.
So there will be big-time options in free agency for a Bruins team that has $16 million in cap space and a clear need to form a “big four” on the back end, with McAvoy, Hampus Lindholm, and Nikita Zadorov already shouldering their share of the load.
There is also a chance the Bruins will be active on the trade market for a D-man as well, with a slew of draft picks and prospects in their treasure trove, along with a potential NHL roster trade chip in the talented Lohrei that clearly has value around the league as a talented 25-year-old that’s still developing into a final NHL product.
“[Lohrei] was going through a [really good] stretch of when he got to play with Hampus [Lindholm], played 20, 25 games. There was a lot more conviction. There was a lot more crispness to his game,” said Sweeney. “Unfortunately, he had some hiccups in the game, and they made a decision [to scratch him in the playoffs] there. Doesn't mean we lose confidence in the player. Players sometimes lose confidence in themselves, and you've got to battle [to get] that back.”
It may be that the B’s have made a hard decision with Lohrei after watching him go through the fairly typical ups and downs of a talented, young D-man making his way through an NHL that doesn’t offer much mercy during the learning curve. But it feels like Boston needs to significantly upgrade a defensemen group that felt like they were more of a liability than they should have been last season.
ONE TIMERS
• Fraser Minten ended his first full NHL season by finishing in the top 10 in Calder Trophy voting for rookie of the year and has continued his strong season with an impressive turn for Team Canada in the World Championships.
The 21-year-old earned player of the game honors for Team Canada in their opening game of the tournament while teaming up with Porter Martone and then scored a goal in their blowout win over Team Italy.
Fraser Minten on the board for Team Canada as his line continues to dominate at World Championships pic.twitter.com/Wp3t5x0FvG
— Joe Haggerty (@HackswithHaggs) May 16, 2026
It is no understatement to say that Minten has been one of Canada’s best and most notable players to this point in the tourney, but we’ll have to see if that continues as things get a little more challenging and move into the medal round later in the tourney.
Minten’s play has been noticeable just as has Team Canada’s choice to play him at the center position on a World Championship roster that also boasts Sidney Crosby, Mack Celebrini, John Tavares, Mark Scheifele, Ryan O’Reilly, and Robert Thomas, among others.
The continued development and experiences for Minten all point to him becoming something significant at the center spot as a frontline 200-foot player for the Black and Gold, and that is most definitely something they will need to keep in mind when roster-building for next season and beyond.
• Speaking of the World Championships, Alex Steeves has been one of the best and most effective players for a Team USA bunch that is a little low on the roster talent level as compared to some of the other teams in the tournament. Steeves had a goal in USA’s opening loss to Switzerland and has been moved to their top line wing with Tommy Novak and Ryan Leonard as they beat up on Great Britain, 5-1, in the second game of the tournament.
Mason Lohrei and James Hagens are also on the USA roster, with Lohrei getting top-pair duty on the back end and Hagens playing fourth-line wing as he continues to adjust to a pro-level game. The 19-year-old Hagens continues to flash speed and skill at times while playing over in Switzerland in a fourth-line role with young linemates like Danny Nelson and Max Plante, but there is clearly some work and maturation to be done this summer to be ready for full-time NHL action next season.
The different impact levels that guys like Steeves and Minten are having in this tournament, as compared to Hagens, really shine a light on how much, quite honestly, the Boston College standout really wasn’t ready for the Stanley Cup playoff role that was thrust on him last month.