The Bruins may be short on offensive star-power after David Pastrnak, but on Tuesday they continued to bolster to their organizational depth at forward.
The B’s re-upped center John Farinacci to a one-year, two-way contract for the league minimum salary cap hit of $775,000. Farinacci had nine goals and 28 assists in 57 games and scored a goal in his NHL debut in the B’s season finale against the Devils on April 15.
Whether he gets a good shot to make the Boston roster remains to be seen.
Penciling in the team’s top two lines seems fairly simple, at least at the moment. The first line that finished the 2024-25 season is still intact with Elias Lindholm centering Pastrnak and Morgan Geekie. The second line could well consist of Casey Mittelstadt centering Viktor Arvidsson and Pavel Zacha.
After that, it’s a mass of bodies consisting of young players with presumed upside and some veterans that have been brought in to improve the overall competitiveness, something that went missing at times in the disappointing ‘24-25 season that hastened the end of an era, triggering deadline trades of Brad Marchand, Charlie Coyle, Brandon Carlo and Trent Frederic.
Starting from the middle out, they have a couple of young, promising players who could cover the last two center spots in Fraser Minton and Matt Poitras while they also have veterans Mark Kastelic, John Beecher, Sean Kuraly and Mikey Eyssimont (the latter two who were signed on July 1), who could play either in the middle or on the wing. Tanner Jeannot, signed to the B’s biggest offseason deal deal (five years at $3.4 million a season) with the belief that he will be the club’s physical tone-setter, will no doubt be in the lineup on nightly basis.
That’s 13 forwards – usually the full complement on an NHL roster – right there. But GM Don Sweeney said on July 1 that if a young players proves in training camp that he belongs on the Boston roster, he will be there. And there is a precedent for that in recent years with the likes of Poitras, Beecher and Jakub Lauko making surprise pushes in camp that result in earning roster spots.
And there are a few players hoping to make a push in September, starting with Fabian Lysell, the 21st overall in 2021. The 22-year-old Lysell got a decent look in Boston at the tail end of the season – 12 games with a goal and two assists – but it wasn’t long enough to prove whether he definitively belongs in the NHL or not. There’s also 24-year-old Georgii Merkulov, who has been close to a point-a-game player in Providence but has not been able to translate that to the next level.
The B’s also added a couple of high-scoring veteran AHL players in 25-year-old Matej Blumel, who posted 39-33-72 totals in 67 games last season for the Texas Stars and was recruited by Czech countryman Pastrnak, and 25-year-old Alex Steeves, who had 36-26-62 in 59 games for the Toronto Marlies. Both have had short stints in the NHL with their previous organizations but weren’t able to stick. They should get a chance to prove whether they were victims of deep NHL rosters in Dallas and Toronto or they are simply very good AHL players.
Another name to watch is former Umass-Amherst star Dans Locmelis, who popped in his short time with Providence late last season, posting 3-9-12 in just six games at the end of the season.
Throw in Farinacci and those are a lot bodies vying for what at the moment looks like zero spots. But while many fans may have already mentally assigned most, if not all, of these players to Providence, this is a season in which management and the new coaching staff under Marco Sturm should have wide-open minds with regard to their bottom-six. Competition begins in-house. While this B’s team as currently constituted looks like a long-shot to make from the Atlantic Division – aka the Division of Death with Florida, Toronto, Tampa Bay, Montreal and Ottawa – rebuilding the team culture can be done before the talent deficit is addressed when high draft picks like James Hagens are ready to contribute in a meaningful way.
With just six preseason games, it will be almost impossible to give all these players a fair shake. But some will be giving a good look, and those players better be ready for them.
