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Matthew Poitras

Matthew Poitras Out For The Season

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Matthew Poitras was one of the bright spots for the Bruins this season, earning a roster spot in training camp and largely playing a regular role since then.  However, his rookie year has come to an early end as the team announced that Poitras has undergone a successful right shoulder open stabilization.  That procedure carries a five-month recovery time, ending his season.  GM Don Sweeney released the following statement on the procedure:

Our medical staff made the recommendation for Matt to proceed with the surgery rather than continue playing with an unstable shoulder and risking further damage. Everyone involved supported the decision as to do what was best for him at this time. Matt is just starting his Bruins career and is a key part of our future.

The 2022 second-round pick had a strong preseason showing to help him break camp with the big club in October and he didn’t look back.  Poitras had five goals and ten assists in 33 games while averaging over 13 minutes a night, a strong first taste of NHL action.  Boston opted to loan him to play for Canada at the World Juniors back in December and he has some success offensively in that event, recording two goals and two helpers in five contests.  Upon returning, his playing time had been more sporadic with this shoulder injury clearly being the reason for that.

Boston is currently using LTIR and will likely be placing Poitras on there in the near future, giving the team a little extra salary cap flexibility.  However, with Poitras on his entry-level contract, the potential cap savings will be limited as his AAV is just $870K with most of that likely being earmarked for whoever the Bruins elect to recall to take his spot on the roster.  Speculatively, Patrick Brown, who has been back and forth several times this season, could be brought up to serve in the reserve forward role while it wouldn’t be surprising to see Sweeney look for some extra depth down the middle before next month’s trade deadline.

While Poitras officially burned the first year of his contract early in the season, the surgery will prevent him from hitting the 40-game benchmark which would have allowed him to accrue a year of service time toward UFA eligibility.  Instead, he won’t be eligible to hit the open market until he turns 27 in 2031.

Atlantic Notes: Woll, Kämpf, Poitras, Forbort, Chaffee, Jeannot

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Maple Leafs netminder Joseph Woll is ramping up his workload in practice as he recovers from a high ankle sprain, head coach Sheldon Keefe said Monday (via Lance Hornby of the Toronto Sun). However, the 25-year-old’s return to game action remains up in the air as his absence stretches into its third month.

Keefe said the Leafs are targeting Woll’s return sometime in the middle of February, but his status has not yet been upgraded to day-to-day. Woll has also not been a full participant in practice since returning to the ice.

The team’s leader in SV% (.916) and goals saved above average (6.2) has been sidelined since a rather innocuous play in the third period of a Dec. 7 contest against the Senators. Luckily for Toronto, they’ve been able to get some solid goaltending performances in his absence – Ilya Samsonov has a 3-1-0 record and .939 SV% in four appearances since clearing waivers at the beginning of January, and third-string veteran Martin Jones has held the fort with a .911 SV% and two shutouts in 17 appearances, along with a 9-6-1 record.

Elsewhere from the Atlantic Division:

  • Sticking with Toronto, Keefe said center David Kämpf will miss at least a week with an undisclosed injury after undergoing an MRI yesterday (via TSN’s Mark Masters). He’s been ruled out for the next three games, opening the door for 24-year-old Pontus Holmberg to get an extended look on Toronto’s fourth line. Kämpf’s status will be upgraded to day-to-day next Monday and could return for the team’s Feb. 13 contest against the Blues. The Maple Leafs do not have cap space to recall a player to replace Kämpf, so they’d likely dress 11 forwards and seven defensemen if an additional injury occurs on offense in the next week.
  • Bruins rookie Matthew Poitras is questionable for Tuesday’s game against the Flames, head coach Jim Montgomery told reporters (including independent Bruins reporter Ty Anderson). He’s only played in three out of Boston’s last nine games and missed the final contest before the All-Star break with an undisclosed injury. The 19-year-old has two assists in six games since returning from representing Canada at the 2024 IIHF World Juniors, in which they failed to medal for the first time since 2019.
  • Montgomery also said defenseman Derek Forbort, who also missed Boston’s last game with an undisclosed injury, won’t be ready for tomorrow’s contest. He confirmed this injury isn’t related to the lower-body injury that’s limited him to 24 games this season and has been lingering since training camp. He played only four games in January after returning from a 20-game absence, logging a +3 rating in bottom-pairing minutes.
  • The Lightning recalled winger Mitchell Chaffee from AHL Syracuse on Monday, per team reporter Chris Krenn. Chaffee, 26, had played in Tampa Bay’s final two games before the All-Star break but was loaned back to Syracuse during their bye week. With Tanner Jeannot and Austin Watson still sidelined, Chaffee will draw into the lineup for his fourth appearance of the season on Wednesday against the Rangers. He’s scored once and added an assist in his three showings thus far, averaging 8:25 per game.
  • While Jeannot remains out Wednesday, it won’t be long until the middle-six grinder is ready to return. Head coach Jon Cooper informed reporters Monday that the team expects him to return at some point during their upcoming four-game road trip, which concludes with a Feb. 13 contest in Boston. Jeannot has struggled in his first full season in the Sunshine State, scoring six goals and 12 points in 41 games while averaging 12:35 per game. It’s the production or role expected of him after Lightning GM Julien BriseBois swung big for his services ahead of last season’s trade deadline, parting with five draft picks, including a 2025 first-round selection. He’s been out of the lineup for nearly a month, sustaining a lower-body injury against the Bruins on Jan. 6.

Bruins To Activate Brandon Carlo And Derek Forbort

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2:03 PM: The team announced that they have officially activated Carlo and Forbort.  To get into cap and roster compliance, center John Beecher and defenseman Mason Lohrei were assigned to AHL Providence.

Beecher has been up with Boston all season, picking up seven points in 39 games.  The 2019 first-rounder has also won over 53% of his faceoffs while averaging a little over 10 minutes a game.  Lohrei, meanwhile, has been up and down between the two levels.  He has six points in 27 games with Boston plus six assists in 10 contests with Providence.

1:48 PM: The Bruins will welcome back a pair of injured blueliners to their lineup tonight against Montreal.  The team announced that Brandon Carlo and Derek Forbort are both set to return with the latter being activated off LTIR.

Carlo has missed close to two weeks with an upper-body injury sustained earlier this month.  The 27-year-old has played in 39 games so far this season, picking up two goals and eight assists.  Of course, Carlo isn’t known for his offensive output but rather for being a sound defensive defender; he’s logging 3:28 per game on the penalty kill – second-most on the Bruins – while blocking 71 shots.

The one player who is ahead of Carlo in shorthanded ATOI is Forbort who was averaging a few seconds more per night in that department before being injured back in early December.  The 31-year-old played in 20 games before the injury, picking up four assists while logging a little over 18 minutes a night.  He’s in the final year of his contract and if Boston wants to try to add an impact player before the deadline, his $3MM cap charge could be used as a potential offset.

Meanwhile, Boston also welcomes back two other injured players tonight who weren’t on injured reserve, goaltender Linus Ullmark and center Matthew Poitras.

Ullmark missed a little over a week after being injured in overtime against Arizona.  He has once again formed a high-end platoon with Jeremy Swayman this season, posting a 2.75 GAA with a .915 SV% in 21 games.  Poitras, meanwhile, has missed a little more than a week with a shoulder injury.  The 19-year-old has fared nicely in his first NHL season, notching 15 points in 30 games so far.

The Bruins still have some work to do before Carlo and Forbort can officially be activated.  They need to clear around $1MM off their books in order to satisfy the cap-compliance portion of taking Forbort off LTIR.  They also need to send at least one player down as they only have one open roster spot at the moment with two players to activate.  They have a few more hours to figure out what those moves will be.

Atlantic Notes: Forbort, Carlo, Poitras, Johnson, Jokiharju

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Both Brandon Carlo and Derek Forbort could return to the Bruins lineup in tomorrow’s game against the Canadiens, says Joe Haggerty of the Boston Sports Journal. The Bruins’ bulkiest two defenders have missed five and 20 games with their respective injuries.

Carlo is on IR, while Forbort is on LTIR. With the Bruins carrying 22 players on the active roster, they will need to assign at least one player to AHL Providence today in order to activate both while keeping their roster at 23 players or less.

Carlo has been by far the more impactful of the two this season. His pairing with Hampus Lindholm has seen the most of any Bruins duo on defense at nearly 400 minutes together, and the 27-year-old continues to solidify himself as a bona fide top-four shutdown defenseman. His 2-8–10 stat line through 39 games isn’t awful for a player boasting his role, and he’s managed to keep an even expected plus-minus rating despite receiving a sky-high 76% of his even-strength zone starts in the defensive end.

The 31-year-old Forbort’s role has been a tad more limited, skating 18:22 per game (Carlo plays over 20) and posting four assists in 20 games. His even-strength possession numbers have cratered since the beginning of last season, reaching a poor 43.5% Corsi share in 2023-24. At this stage in his career, the majority of Forbort’s value comes on the penalty kill, where he’s still graded out below average this season. He remains under contract at a $3MM cap hit through the end of this season.

More from the Atlantic Division today:

  • Making progress in his return but unlikely to play tomorrow is Bruins rookie Matthew Poitras, who head coach Jim Montgomery told reporters (including Haggerty) today “has a few more boxes to check” before he can play again. The 19-year-old last played on Jan. 9 and has missed four games with a shoulder injury. He’s played in only three of eight games since returning from representing Canada at the 2024 IIHF World Junior Championship in Sweden. The 2022 second-round pick has provided great value for the Bruins earlier than expected on his entry-level contract, posting 10-5–15 through his first 30 NHL games.
  • The Sabres have listed veteran defenseman Erik Johnson as day-to-day with an upper-body injury, per a team announcement. The 35-year-old left yesterday’s 3-0 win over the Blackhawks early in the third period after he was checked from behind by Blackhawks winger Philipp Kurashev. Kurashev was assessed a five-minute major penalty for boarding on the play, but no supplemental discipline is expected. Johnson has been a healthy scratch four times in 45 games this year after signing a one-year, $3.25MM pact with Buffalo in free agency. He’s notched three goals and a +2 rating in 14:11 of average ice time but is still looking for his first assist as a Sabre. Defenseman Henri Jokiharju is also listed as day-to-day with general soreness, putting both their availabilities for tomorrow’s game against the Lightning in doubt. A rotating cast of injuries may force the Sabres to recall an additional defenseman from AHL Rochester tomorrow after bringing up Jacob Bryson yesterday.

Afternoon Notes: Bruins, Cates, Senators

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The Boston Bruins saw a quartet of players return to practice, including rookie forward Matthew Poitras, defensemen Brandon Carlo and Derek Forbort, and starting goaltender Linus Ullmark. All four players were held out of the team’s Monday afternoon win over the New Jersey Devils. Of the four returnees, Poitras and Ullmark are the two who have avoided an injured reserve placement. Poitras is working his way back from a shoulder injury that’s held him out of the Bruins’ last three games, while Ullmark is coming back from a lower-body injury suffered in Boston’s overtime loss to the Arizona Coyotes one week ago. Carlo is facing an upper-body injury, while Forbort is facing an undisclosed injury that’s troubled him since training camp and earned him a placement on long-term IR in early December.

The Bruins are also missing forward Milan Lucic with injury – but they’ve progressed nicely regardless, going 2-0-1 in the three games they’ve played since losing Ullmark last Tuesday. Roster holes have been plugged by Jesper Boqvist, who is seeing his first NHL action since December, and Brandon Bussi, who is currently backing up Jeremy Swayman and could make his NHL debut if Swayman needs a breather before Ullmark is ready to return. Boqvist has managed two points in seven NHL games this year, while Bussi has operated as the starter for the AHL’s Providence Bruins and managed a .901 save percentage in 20 AHL games.

The Bruins also saw the return of Pavel Zacha on Monday. The 26-year-old missed the team’s Saturday win with illness.

Other notes from around the league:

  • Noah Cates is set to return to the Philadelphia Flyers lineup on Monday evening, as the Philadelphia Flyers take on the St. Louis Blues. Cates has been out since November 25th with a foot injury. He was off to a slow start to the season, managing just four points in 21 games – a step down from the 38 points he recorded in 82 games as a rookie last season.
  • The Ottawa Senators have promoted Justin Peters to the role of goaltending coach and assigned Zac Bierk to a scouting and development position. Peters is an 83-game veteran of the NHL, setting a career .901 save percentage. He also played in 301 career AHL games and managed a career .907 save percentage. He has been a goalie coach with the AHL’s Belleville Senators since the 2021-22 season.

Bruins Place Brandon Carlo On IR, Recall Brandon Bussi

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The Bruins placed defenseman Brandon Carlo on injured reserve retroactive to January 8, according to a team release. In a corresponding transaction, the team elevated netminder Brandon Bussi from AHL Providence on an emergency basis. Head coach Jim Montgomery said that 2023 Vezina Trophy winner Linus Ullmark is day-to-day with a lower-body injury and will not play tonight against the Golden Knights, so Bussi will back up Ullmark’s tandem partner, Jeremy Swayman.

Ullmark isn’t the only player who sustained an injury in Tuesday’s overtime loss to the Coyotes. Rookie Matthew Poitras suffered a shoulder injury and will also miss tonight’s game. He, too, is listed as day-to-day.

Carlo left the team’s game on Monday against the Avalanche in the second period with an upper-body injury, although it wasn’t clear what caused the premature exit. As a result of the IR placement, the 27-year-old has been ruled out of the team’s next three games. He will be eligible to return next Thursday against the Avalanche.

In 39 games this season, the Bruins’ top shutdown defender has two goals, eight assists, ten points, and a team-high +15 rating while averaging over 20 minutes per game. AHL call-up Parker Wotherspoon, who has two assists and a +2 rating in 13 NHL appearances this season, is projected to remain in a second-pairing role alongside Hampus Lindholm in Carlo’s absence.

Luckily for the Bruins, it doesn’t appear anyone else’s absence is extremely long-term, either. It’s a tough loss to go without Ullmark for a stretch, who’s again been one of the better goalies in the league with a .915 SV% and 8.1 goals saved above average in 20 starts (21 appearances), but Swayman has put up slightly better numbers this season in the same amount of action.

In his place for now will be the 25-year-old Bussi. Named to the AHL’s All-Rookie Team last season after he posted a .924 SV% in 32 appearances for Providence in his first season after completing his collegiate career at Western Michigan, he’s taken a significant step back this year with a .901 SV% and 10-6-3 record in 20 appearances. He’s been recalled on multiple occasions over the past two years due to short-term injuries to Swayman and Ullmark, and although he’s solidly third on Boston’s depth chart, he’s still yet to make his NHL debut.

Poitras, 19, was injured in his third game back after representing Canada at the 2024 IIHF World Junior Championship in Sweden. The 2022 second-round pick has five goals and 15 points while averaging 13:46 through his first 30 NHL contests.

Bruins Loan Matthew Poitras To Team Canada For 2024 World Juniors

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The Bruins have loaned rookie center Matthew Poitras to Team Canada for the upcoming 2024 IIHF World Junior Championships in Gothenburg, Sweden, a team release states.

Poitras, 19, is a tremendous addition to a Canada roster that’s thinner on offense than we’re used to seeing. Canadiens prospect Owen Beck is the only returnee from last year’s group, which captured the gold medal thanks to one of the best single-tournament showings of all time from then-17-year-old Connor Bedard. The roster still features six recent first-round picks on offense and one future first-overall selection: 17-year-old Boston University center Macklin Celebrini, who is third in NCAA Division I men’s hockey in points per game.

When Hockey Canada announced the cuts from their preliminary roster last week, they left a spot open for one forward to join the team, hoping an NHL team would part with a rostered under-20 prospect. That spot will go to Poitras, the 54th overall pick in 2022, who few expected to crack the Bruins’ roster out of camp.

Poitras’ 13 points in 27 games rank eighth on the Bruins in scoring, although he’s seen a diminished role as the calendar shifted to December. Head coach Jim Montgomery has made Poitras a healthy scratch in two of the last five games after playing in all of Boston’s first 24 contests.

Still, given how well he fits into the Boston lineup, Poitras is expected to return to the Bruins after the tournament ends instead of being loaned out to his junior team, the OHL’s Guelph Storm. He’s averaged 14:06 per game this season for Boston, ranking seventh among their forwards and solidly positioning him in a top-nine role.

Assuming Canada advances to the medal games, Poitras will miss the Bruins’ next eight games at a minimum. The tournament wraps up on January 5, 2024, making him doubtful for the Bruins’ game against the Lightning on January 6, meaning at least a nine-game absence is most likely.

What Your Team Is Thankful For: Boston Bruins

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As Thanksgiving and the holiday season approaches, PHR will be taking a look at what teams are thankful for in 2023-24. There also might be a few things your team would like down the road. We’ll examine what’s gone well in the early going and what could improve as the season rolls on for the Boston Bruins.

Who are the Bruins thankful for?

Jeremy Swayman and Linus Ullmark

Boston’s goaltending wasn’t just great last season, it was historically great. And with the litany of NHL all-stars that departed Boston this summer, many pundits figured that the Bruins’ historical 65-win season would be a distant memory as they struggled through this season. That has not been the case, in fact, the Bruins aren’t just as good as last year. Thus far this season, they are actually better. Last season at this time Boston was sporting an incredible .823 points percentage, but this year they are sitting at an unfathomable .861.

Sure, they still have some of the pieces from their strong core kicking around, but the real reasons they are historically good once again this season are Swayman and Ullmark.

Swayman and Ullmark have split goaltending duties almost directly down the middle this season with incredibly close comparables. Swayman is currently sporting a record of 7-0-2 with a 2.09 goals-against average and a .933 save percentage. Ullmark on the other hand is 7-1-1 with a 2.10 goals-against average and a .932 save percentage.

To find a discrepancy between the two netminders it requires a deep dive into the numbers. According to Money Puck, Swayman has saved one full goal more when you look at both goaltenders’ goals saved above expected. Swayman has posted a 7.6 goals saved above expected while Ullmark has posted 6.6. The calculation by Money Puck is done by taking the goals that a goalie is expected to allow and then subtracting the actual number of goals the goalie has let in. Both Ullmark and Swayman are well above average in this category and every other goaltending metric.

There was talk in the summer that maybe the Bruins would like to move on from Ullmark, but it is hard to fathom Boston breaking up such an incredible duo. Goaltending is a notoriously difficult position to project and it’s rare for teams to get one goalie playing as well as Swayman or Ullmark, and having two is unheard of.

What are the Bruins thankful for?

Surprising play from their top centers.

When Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci announced their retirements in August, many thought that it could be curtains for the Bruins time atop the NHL standings. But, from the moment the puck dropped to start the NHL season they have received quality work from their top two centers Pavel Zacha and Charlie Coyle.

Zacha’s year didn’t start out great as he had just a single assist in the first five games of the season, but since that time he has posted seven goals and six assists in his past 13 games. On top of finding his offensive game, Zacha is averaging almost three and a half minutes more ice time per game than his career average and is finding far more success in the faceoff circle winning draws at a rate that is almost five percent higher than last season.

Coyle on the other hand is on pace for a career season and has fit the role of a top-6 center perfectly. At the moment the 31-year-old is on pace for 32 goals and 41 assists should he dress in all 82 games. Now a lot would have to go right for Coyle to hit those numbers, but the odds are pretty good that he will top the career-high 56 points he put up in the 2016-17 season. Coyle isn’t just doing good work on the offensive side of the game; he has also been a huge part of Boston’s penalty kill and has been dominant in the face-off circle.

What would the Bruins be even more thankful for?

More scoring from the backend

It’s hard to be wishing for more when your team is 14-1-3 to start the season. But if the Bruins were looking for a little something extra it would be more scoring from their defense core. So far this season, Bruins defensemen have accounted for just seven goals and 28 assists. Now, those numbers aren’t horrible, and they certainly don’t paint a fair picture of all their defensemen’s contributions. But the collective 35 points from the Bruins defense core barely tops the 31 points that Vancouver Canucks defenseman Quinn Hughes has put up on his own this season.

Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery has said in press conferences that he would like to see the Bruins’ defensemen adopt more of a shot-first mentality and he would especially like to see his rearguards be in shot-ready mode at any time.

There is merit to what Montgomery is preaching. The Bruins have a ton of big forwards who can drive to the net and get sticks on pucks, or at the very least cause disruption and perhaps create a seam for a seeing-eye shot from a defenseman to find its way into the back of the net.

The Bruins could certainly look to conference foe the Carolina Hurricanes to see how an active defense core can score a lot of goals from the point just by simply being selfish and shot-happy when the shooting lanes open.

What should be on the Bruins holiday wish list?

A top-6 forward.

To be fair, the Bruins really don’t have any needs at the moment. And if there is anything that can be taken away from last year’s playoff collapse it is that often it doesn’t payoff to go all in.

The Bruins don’t have many trade chips to bolster their lineup at this year’s trade deadline, but that doesn’t mean they won’t. If they were to decide to make an impact move at the trade deadline, acquiring a top-6 forward must be top of mind for general manager Don Sweeney.

The Bruins current top-6 is formidable, but it is hard to imagine a team with Stanley Cup aspirations feeling overly comfortable with 34-year-old James van Riemsdyk eating up big minutes come playoff time. That’s no slight on van Riemsdyk, who has been terrific this year, but the reality is that he would be better suited to dress on the team’s third line with Matthew Poitras and Jake DeBrusk

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Atlantic Notes: Knight, Poitras, Klingberg

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Eyebrows raised this morning when the Florida Panthers announced presumptive backup netminder Spencer Knight would start the 2023-24 campaign with AHL Charlotte. However, head coach Paul Maurice said today it’s not a performance-related demotion.

In fact, it’s quite the opposite. Knight missed the last two months of the regular season and all of the Panthers’ run to the Stanley Cup Final after entering the NHL/NHLPA Player Assistance Program, which he later said was to get treatment for obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). After missing significant time, Knight still managed to churn out an incredibly strong postseason performance – one that influenced the organization to want to give him a chance as a true starter out of the gate this season in order to maintain his positive momentum. “This was something we looked at from the start (of training camp),” Maurice told NHL.com. “He’s made great progress in his program. He feels good, he looked fantastic in training camp. But we need to put him in kind of a No. 1 position, a No. 1 role, and then run his program and work on what he’s been working on. But he’s been good.” The 22-year-old is beginning the first season of a three-year deal carrying a $4.5MM cap hit, meaning he’ll still carry a significant cap penalty while in the AHL, as that’s far above the buriable threshold – $3.35MM, to be exact. Veteran Anthony Stolarz will sit behind undisputed starter Sergei Bobrovsky to start the season after the latter guided Florida to its second Stanley Cup Final in franchise history last season.

Elsewhere in the Atlantic Division today:

  • One of the surprise rookies of training camps leaguewide has been Boston Bruins center Matthew Poitras, just one season removed from going off the board at 54th overall at the 2022 NHL Draft. He’s played so well, in fact, that the 19-year-old may just have an inside track to make the team out of camp. As rosters continue to get trimmed, Bruins independent reporter Joe Haggerty noted Poitras continued to stay with the main group in practice today, centering a prospective third line between Trent Frederic and Morgan Geekie. That’s a notable development for Poitras, as he’s impressed enough to push Geekie, the team’s free-agent signing that they expected to fill a third-line hole, out to the wing. The Bruins can still defer the start of his entry-level contract to 2024-25 if he plays less than ten games before Boston re-assigns him to the OHL’s Guelph Storm.
  • After battling an upper-body injury throughout the last week, Toronto Maple Leafs defenseman John Klingberg will be ready for the team’s season-opening contest against the Montreal Canadiens on Wednesday, head coach Sheldon Keefe tells NHL.com’s Dave McCarthy. Klingberg, the team’s key free agency addition to their top four on defense, says he feels good enough to play in tomorrow’s preseason finale against the Detroit Red Wings but that he’s “going to listen to the doctors, I think they’re smart enough to know.” The veteran 31-year-old power-play quarterback is expected to see reps on the team’s top man-advantage unit to start the season, allowing longtime Leaf Morgan Rielly to help bolster the second power-play unit.

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