The Athletic - Boston McDonald: Q&A with Bruins Coach Bruce Cassidy on the season, the Caps, the top line, and Kovalchuk

[Fenway]

The Athletic-Boston is quickly becoming the best site in the US covering the NHL and their Bruins coverage is now solid.

Q&A with Bruins Coach Bruce Cassidy on the season, the Caps, the top line, and Kovalchuk

The Athletic: Obviously, you would rather play deep into June, but how important was this time from the end of the season until now to prepare for next season?

Cassidy: The biggest thing we did is sat down with pro scouting staff, management and coaching staff and talked about basically what we liked and room for improvement. Once we addressed those things, it’s, ‘OK, how are we going to get there?’ Do we have to go outside the organization? What’s coming? What’s ready?
Last year we went through this exercise and we decided we had some good, young people and gave them the opportunity. This year, it’s the same conversation. Are they ready? Again, those are always good conversations because you don’t know but you project.


Down the middle of the ice, we talked about Riley Nash, who’s a free agent, and what happens if he doesn’t return. Is one of the kids ready? (Jakob) Forsbacka Karlsson, (Trent) Frederic, (Jack) Studnicka, so those are the interesting conversations. We spent a lot of time on that. Stuff gets tossed around the room about what people hear outside the organization, so that’s always good for a staff. For example: the team really played fast and that’s what we hear from others, so we want that. The negatives, obviously, is what happened in the playoffs and we didn’t get it done. You go through those things and that was the biggest thing for me.

You watch the playoffs. You watch Washington and its (defense) core – (Michal) Kempny, (Christian) Djoos – these guys that are playing are not huge and fast, or big and mean, but they’re puck movers and they got it done. (The Capitals) defended the neutral zone and we needed to do a better job of that in the playoffs. Ottawa did it last year, Nashville too and now Washington, so you’ve got to take certain parts of it.

Then, don’t (discredit) your entire season. We were still a pretty good team during the year and we don’t want to get too far away from what we did well.

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[Chief Nine]

The Athletic-Boston is quickly becoming the best site in the US covering the NHL and their Bruins coverage is now solid.

Q&A with Bruins Coach Bruce Cassidy on the season, the Caps, the top line, and Kovalchuk

The Athletic: Obviously, you would rather play deep into June, but how important was this time from the end of the season until now to prepare for next season?

Cassidy: The biggest thing we did is sat down with pro scouting staff, management and coaching staff and talked about basically what we liked and room for improvement. Once we addressed those things, it’s, ‘OK, how are we going to get there?’ Do we have to go outside the organization? What’s coming? What’s ready?
Last year we went through this exercise and we decided we had some good, young people and gave them the opportunity. This year, it’s the same conversation. Are they ready? Again, those are always good conversations because you don’t know but you project.


Down the middle of the ice, we talked about Riley Nash, who’s a free agent, and what happens if he doesn’t return. Is one of the kids ready? (Jakob) Forsbacka Karlsson, (Trent) Frederic, (Jack) Studnicka, so those are the interesting conversations. We spent a lot of time on that. Stuff gets tossed around the room about what people hear outside the organization, so that’s always good for a staff. For example: the team really played fast and that’s what we hear from others, so we want that. The negatives, obviously, is what happened in the playoffs and we didn’t get it done. You go through those things and that was the biggest thing for me.

You watch the playoffs. You watch Washington and its (defense) core – (Michal) Kempny, (Christian) Djoos – these guys that are playing are not huge and fast, or big and mean, but they’re puck movers and they got it done. (The Capitals) defended the neutral zone and we needed to do a better job of that in the playoffs. Ottawa did it last year, Nashville too and now Washington, so you’ve got to take certain parts of it.

Then, don’t (discredit) your entire season. We were still a pretty good team during the year and we don’t want to get too far away from what we did well.

Wise words right there. Too many want to do just that and toss out what they accomplished during the regular season and overlook the fact that the Bruins are young and went way farther than anyone anticipated. The future is bright with this team, coaching staff and management

 

[BruinsFanSince94]

I have TheAthletic subscription, so reading the whole interview, this was good stuff. I wanted to focus on this part, since I found it interesting. Cassidy gave a lot here:

The other option is dropping Pasta down and moving someone else up with Bergy and Marchy. Could that be someone through free agency, and I include Rick Nash in that, or is that internal? Maybe Danton Heinen is ready to go up there, and we use our resources for the third-line center if Riley Nash leaves. There are a lot of ifs, right?

We saw what (Ryan) Donato can do and we hope he’s going to have a good summer and push for a spot somewhere in the top nine, so we’ll see where he plays out. He’s played some center before, but can he do it in the NHL? He hasn’t had many games there at all.

The bolded is definitely something that has been thrown around here; even if it isn't Heinen, specifically. I do find it interesting that Cassidy says Heinen, specifically, though. He would be my choice for that spot. We know his game. He's a very smart player with ability to play all three zones effectively. While he's not a fast player, he still moves well and the IQ is there. He has a nice hard shot, that hopefully he uses more this upcoming season. In-house, I do think he's the best option for it. Struggled in the playoffs, but you can't discredit a 47 point rookie season, a majority of that coming from playing 3rd line. He always seemed to be productive when moved into the Top 6 as well (filled in for Marchand nicely when he was suspended; I believe 5P/5GP. Also, remember him moving up in the EDM game with Krejci, and being a key factor on the GWG).

Resources for 3rd line center, as it shows in the (free) example, could be any of those prospects for the position, but in the second part of the above, ties into that part. He mentions Donato (as you can see). While he states the fact that Donato has no NHL experience at the position, it seems the organization isn't against seeing what he can do there. Going in-house for the 3rd line center would help a lot.

 

[ODAAT]

I have TheAthletic subscription, so reading the whole interview, this was good stuff. I wanted to focus on this part, since I found it interesting. Cassidy gave a lot here:


The bolded is definitely something that has been thrown around here; even if it isn't Heinen, specifically. I do find it interesting that Cassidy says Heinen, specifically, though. He would be my choice for that spot. We know his game. He's a very smart player with ability to play all three zones effectively. While he's not a fast player, he still moves well and the IQ is there. He has a nice hard shot, that hopefully he uses more this upcoming season. In-house, I do think he's the best option for it. Struggled in the playoffs, but you can't discredit a 47 point rookie season, a majority of that coming from playing 3rd line. He always seemed to be productive when moved into the Top 6 as well (filled in for Marchand nicely when he was suspended; I believe 5P/5GP. Also, remember him moving up in the EDM game with Krejci, and being a key factor on the GWG).

Resources for 3rd line center, as it shows in the (free) example, could be any of those prospects for the position, but in the second part of the above, ties into that part. He mentions Donato (as you can see). While he states the fact that Donato has no NHL experience at the position, it seems the organization isn't against seeing what he can do there. Going in-house for the 3rd line center would help a lot.

Loving the Athletic myself

Interesting comments on Heinen as you pointed out. Rough playoff but hardly a surprise when we see a younger player or first time playoff appearances show players where they need to bring their game to in order to compete.

I`m an unapologetic fanboy of Heinen so my view is likely biased and I`m also an admitted fan of players who don`t take short cuts on the ice and he doesn`t. He`s not the finished product and that`s exciting regardless of where he plays in the lineup

 

[BruinsFanSince94]

Loving the Athletic myself

Interesting comments on Heinen as you pointed out. Rough playoff but hardly a surprise when we see a younger player or first time playoff appearances show players where they need to bring their game to in order to compete.

I`m an unapologetic fanboy of Heinen so my view is likely biased and I`m also an admitted fan of players who don`t take short cuts on the ice and he doesn`t. He`s not the finished product and that`s exciting regardless of where he plays in the lineup

Big fanboy as well. I don't think anyone will reach @GloryDaze4877 but if you can't watch the player and appreciate what he brings, and how good he is, there's no hope for you haha

 

[ODAAT]

Big fanboy as well. I don't think anyone will reach @GloryDaze4877 but if you can't watch the player and appreciate what he brings, and how good he is, there's no hope for you haha

haha, yep, and many of the little things not found on the score sheet that he does one can`t always see on TV either. Those who are fortunate enough to watch our boys live see things we don`t have the luxury of seeing sitting on our couches.

Heinen had a few stretches during the season where he wasn`t contributing much offensively however, during those times, what I did like was he didn`t allow those slumps to affect how he played away from the puck and nope, NOBODY loves the kid more than GloryDaze