Decreasing odd-man rushes against a big reason for Boston Bruins’ success

Tyler Yaremchuk and Colby Cohen were joined by Jon Goyens to discuss the Boston Bruins’ season on the latest episode of Daily Faceoff Live.

Tyler Yaremchuk: Today we’re talking about the Boston Bruins. First in the Atlantic and first in the Eastern Conference right now and this is after losing Bergeron and Krejci in the offseason, where everyone thought the center depth would kill them and they’d take a step back. How have they survived up the middle and maybe dig in a little bit on the faceoffs as well.

Jon Goyens: Well, they’re just surviving in the faceoff circle. Because in the four major categories for faceoffs, overall, even strength, power play, and short handed they were top four in all four categories last year. This year, they’re only top in one category, and that’s on the power play and they’ve dipped by one percent. So if you’re a team that loses a lot of faceoffs, I’ll go back to the New York Islanders with their back-to-back conference runs, they weren’t dynamite in the faceoff circle but what happens next is that much more important.

I think a team like Boston with a coach like Jim Montgomery who’s very into details, the importance of what you do after you lose a faceoff, reloading and getting above pucks and identifying your man has been key to them surviving not winning as many draws as they did last year.

Colby Cohen: You look at the areas that they’ve been so successful, they sit third overall in goals against per games played in the NHL. And you wonder is that their D-core, is that their back pressure, just what makes them so successful in the way that they defend and why they don’t give up goals?

Jon Goyens: Yeah, it’s the rush against. You could have a good start and they’ve had a good start but actually in their last 21 games, they’re 13-4-4 and the focus has been on significantly decreasing odd-man rushes against so before Christmas they were about 26th in the league in odd-man rushes against at even strength. Since then, they’re second. So that commitment keeps evolving, that’s what makes really good coaches, Jim Montgomery for example, you lose certain players but you have to adapt as the season goes on, not just in the offseason.

You can watch the rest of the episode here: