The 2023-24 Bruins will rely heavily on Linus Ullmark and Jeremy Swayman to remain competitive. Swayman welcomes the challenge.
"If we compete with each other at the highest level, we're gonna give our team a chance to win any given night.”
Few teams have been struck with a talent drain as severely as the 2023-24 Bruins.
Granted, such a painful offseason was expected for a roster that placed all of its chips on the table in search of a Stanley Cup.
But a Bruins team once buoyed with depth is suddenly looking very thin up front.
Patrice Bergeron has hung up his skates, while Boston’s other top-six center in David Krejci still unsigned and mulling his future.
The Bruins dealt middle-six stalwart Taylor Hall to alleviate some of their cap crunch, albeit not enough to retain Tyler Bertuzzi in free agency.
If the 2023-24 Bruins hope to remain competitive as they brace for a potential spending spree next summer, a lot will need to fall on a stingy D corps and Boston’s last line of defense in goaltenders Linus Ullmark and Jeremy Swayman.
For Swayman, it’s a challenge that both he and his netminding partner plan on embracing as they try to put last season in the rearview mirror.
“I stuck around Boston this summer,” Swayman said when asked about added motivation for the 2023-24 season. And there’s a big reason for that. And that was I knew I was gonna get the best training, the best coaching and the best atmosphere to get better.
“So that was a commitment that I wanted to make personally, to make sure that I was gonna do everything I could to not have that feeling again in Game 7. And I think it’s been one of the better training years of my life because of that.”
Boston has hope that internal candidates like Pavel Zacha and Charlie Coyle can offer up more in expanded roles up front. Free-agent pickups like James van Riemsdyk and Morgan Geekie can add some scoring punch at a lower pay grade, while youngsters like Jakub Lauko or Georgii Merkulov will get every opportunity to fight for minutes.
But it’s clear that the Bruins will not wield the same offensive firepower they had in 2022-23, when Boston ranked second in the NHL in scoring at 3.67 goals per contest.
That being said, Boston does return a number of key cogs to a defense that ranked first in the league in goals against per contest (2.12), with Kevin Shattenkirk expected to slot in for Connor Clifton on Boston’s third pairing.
And of course, the duo of Ullmark and Swayman served as an equalizer throughout Boston’s record-setting season.
Ullmark had a season for the ages, winning his first Vezina Trophy after posting a 40-6-1 record and leading the league in both GAA (1.89) and save percentage (.938). But Boston’s “1B” netminder in Swayman was far from a just a contingency plan in net for Jim Montgomery and his staff.
In 37 games last season, Swayman went 24-6-4 with a .920 save percentage, 2.27 GAA, and four shutouts.
Swayman’s underlying metrics were just as sterling. The Alaskan native ranked fifth in the NHL in high-danger save percentage (.870), per Natural Stat Trick, while his 11.63 goals saved above average during 5v5 play ranked 13th among all netminders across the league.
Even if Ullmark does undergo some regression from the video-game-like numbers he put forth in 2022-23, Swayman’s age (24) and sound mechanics offers hope that his growth and development will keep Boston’s record-setting defense intact.
Of course, such a scenario could create an interesting dynamic between two fast friends in Ullmark and Swayman, especially if one starts to significantly outperform the other.
But even with their usual post-victory hugs and close bond, Swayman said that the high standards he and Ullmark set for one another create a dynamic that fuels both of them over the course of a long season.
“That’s what makes it so special is that if we didn’t have that, we’d be pissed at each other, because that wouldn’t elevate our game,” Swayman when asked of internal competition against Ullmark. “And that’s something that we really take seriously. I’m not competing as hard, he’s not competing as hard in practice — we know that if we slump in games, the other guy’s gonna take that net. And that’s what’s gonna elevate our level of every single game.
“And so that’s something that could get overlooked at times from a viewer standpoint, but on the ice, him and I know that if we’re not elevating our game every single day, that one of the other guys is gonna take over the net and we’re not going to get each other better and we’re not going to help this team get better. So that kind of mentality that we’ve had has taken care of itself, because we know that if we compete with each other at the highest level, we’re gonna give our team a chance to win any given night.”
If Ullmark and Swayman maintain their high level of play, Boston’s defense shouldn’t spring too many leaks next season — especially with a healthy Hampus Lindholm and Charlie McAvoy anchoring the Bruins D corps.
Boston has the personnel in place to grind out points thanks to its structured and stingy defense, even with other teams in the Eastern Conference like the rebuilding Sabres and retooling Penguins expected to take steps forward.
There’s no doubt that the Bruins will need more players up front to step up in order to alleviate the pressure put on their two netminders.
But with training camp a little over a month away, Swayman likes the new foundation that has been built as Boston prepares for the post-Bergeron era.
“He’s a player we’re gonna miss, the game of hockey is gonna miss,” Swayman said of Bergeron. He’s put in such an incredible foundation for the Bruins and being a young guy that going forward is going to be part of this organization for a long time.
“I know that we’re gonna do everything we can to continue the legacy that he’s built. … I know that our management isn’t going to bring in guys that are going to bring us down. So I know that, again, we’re gonna have the tools we need to succeed. I can’t wait for that.”
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