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Don Sweeney explains decision to fire Jim Montgomery, diagnoses Bruins’ poor start
"We’re either going to get back there. Or there are going to be continued changes across the board.”
There’s no ducking the numbers.
The 2024-25 Bruins rank 31st in the NHL in goals scored per game (2.40). Their power play is dead last in the league (11.7 percent). Down the other end of the ice, Boston ranks 27th in goals against per game (3.45) and 25th overall on the penalty kill (75.6 percent).
According to MoneyPuck, Boston’s top netminder in Jeremy Swayman has a goals saved above expected rate of -7.3. In other words, a league-average goalie would have stopped over seven more goals than Swayman so far this fall
It’s downright ugly in Boston — with those numbers painting the picture of a team far worse than their already mediocre 8-9-3 record.
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As such, Don Sweeney had to make a change this week.
“I have nothing but respect and utmost appreciation for Jim Montgomery as a hockey coach and as a person,’ Sweeney said Wednesday in his first media address after firing Boston’s head coach less than 24 hours earlier, adding: “It came from a decision of, our team really, just not performing at the level of expectations that we have grown to appreciate, as a fan of the sporting community here, and for me, I had to change course.”
Montgomery’s resume speaks for itself. In a little over two years in Boston, he sported a record of 120-41-23 over 184 total games.
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Even with a crushing first-round exit at the hands of the Panthers in 2023, Montgomery’s lighter approach in the dressing room and behind the bench helped fuel a record-setting 65-win campaign.
But it became clear that wherever magic Montgomery worked over his first two years behind Boston’s bench lost its potency this season.
“I just didn’t like the direction,” Sweeney said of Boston’s inconsistent play. “We’ve had a small incremental bump in terms of going to play the right way in Philadelphia and coming home to Seattle, but we couldn’t maintain it. Even in the course of games we couldn’t. We’re in a 2-1 hockey game in Dallas … all of a sudden — bang: three goals?
“That’s just part of the things that bother me as a General Manager, where our team can’t stay as close as they’ve been, can’t get through the adversities within the game, and they can’t respond from game to game and that’s where I make a decision.”
Every team needs to account for regression or a decline in play. But even Sweeney has been shocked at just how many key cogs have seemingly plummeted in their play through 20 games.
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“You’ve got maybe upwards of ten players off of what their norms would be, not even their high side of things if you go back a year ago,” Sweeney acknowledged. “So that’s concerning and that’s been part of this. Special teams, which has been a strong staple of our organization for a number of years and they’re well underwater. … Couple that with where our goaltending was last year versus the up and down a little bit in performance level there.
“It’s team wide, and that’s where it’s confounding to me, in looking at every little area of our group that we need to be better from structure on out. We need to make sure our players understand that that’s not the standard. So, we’re going to go to work on it.”
Boston’s roster-wide struggles have been well-documented at this point. While star talents like David Pastrnak and Brad Marchand haven’t pulled their weight, secondary scorers have all but disappeared. Pavel Zacha, Trent Frederic, Charlie Coyle, and Morgan Geekie have seven total even-strength tallies through 20 games.
Sweeney brushed aside talk that Boston’s top free-agent signings in Elias Lindholm and Nikita Zadorov aren’t a “good fit” — but stressed that they “have not played to the level we expected them to”.
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For Sweeney, a disheartening training camp served as an omen for what was to come during regular-season action.
With Lindholm banged up during camp, Pastrnak working his way back from an injury suffered during World Championships, and Marchand sidelined after three offseason procedures, Boston’s top stars were hindered out of the gate.
Swayman’s contentious contract talks, and the Bruins struggled to find any semblance of traction before jumping into an 82-game gauntlet.
Add in both Swayman’s contentious contract talks and several self-assured players after posting career years in 2023-24, and the subpar results speak for themselves.
“I don’t want to be too specific and too critical on any one singular player, I just felt our camp was flatline across the board,” Sweeney acknowledged. “And to me, that was the first troubling sign … we were flat all the way through training camp.
“Whether or not they thought it was going to be easy, and the guys had really good last year would come out, and it would just fall into place. This league is incredibly humbling if you have that approach to the game, and it’ll expose you in a hurry and that’s sort of what’s happened to our group.”
Sweeney and the Bruins are holding out hope that interim head coach Joe Sacco can give the team a much-needed spark.
But if a Bruins season that opened with so much optimism continues to flatline, Sweeney will be faced with more difficult decisions.
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“Moving forward, that rests with me now,” Sweeney said. “From a personnel standpoint, from the players’ standpoint, they have to understand they’re not where they need to be. We’re either going to get back there. Or there are going to be continued changes across the board.”
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