Boston Bruins: Who do you put on David Krejci’s right wing?

The Boston Bruins have a strong top-six group, there’s no doubting that. However, there is a weakness on the right-wing heading into the 2019-20 season.

When it comes to your first choice right-winger in the Boston Bruins line-up, regardless of which teammates you match him with, it’s David Pastrnak. That goes almost without saying. Much like considering anyone but Brad Marchand as the first choice left winger.

With regard to the center depth, you could make an argument for pushing David Krejci into a first line role thus shuffling Patrice Bergeron to a second line role. Equally, you could make the same argument in reverse; keep Bergeron on the top line and keep Krejci on the second – both make sense on some level.

The Boston Bruins are lucky enough to have Marchand and Jake DeBrusk as left wing depth and Bergeron and Krejci down the middle. Unfortunately, when you look beyond Pastrnak on the right-hand side, it’s a bit of a mixed bag.

Last season saw David Backes play a fair bit on the right, likewise Danton Heinen. In the playoffs, the Boston Bruins even experimented, to some success, with Karson Kuhlman in that spot. In all three of these cases, nobody truly lives up to the billing of a right-winger worthy of Krejci’s talents.

Given the contracts that will be dished out to blue-line talent, Charlie McAvoy and Brandon Carlo; it’s highly unlikely the Boston Bruins can look externally to fill the gap, so it’s all down to the internal options next season.

We break down the guys that could potentially step into the role on the right.

The ‘why not give them a go’ options: Karson Kuhlman and Brett Ritchie

Karson Kuhlman

Karson Kuhlman isn’t necessarily the obvious choice, but coach Bruce Cassidy clearly saw enough potential in him to give him starts in the Stanley Cup Final alongside DeBrusk and Krejci.

If anything, you can make the argument that the position is his to lose. He showed plenty of energy and a burst of pace that certainly left the Blues looking flat-footed at times. If the Boston Bruins want their second line to have a speed element, Kuhlman is definitely the man for the job.

Perhaps the biggest reason that Kuhlman doesn’t get the job is inexperience, though he was an assistant captain for two years and captain in his final year at the University of Minnesota-Duluth, suggesting he has a head on his shoulders that can lead and no doubt adapt on the fly to NHL life.

Let’s not forget, he now has Stanley Cup Final experience to go with his 11 regular season games with the Boston Bruins and his 60 AHL games. It’s not like he’s a complete rookie when it comes to professional hockey. At 23 years-old, he’s not going to look like as much of a deer in the headlights as a teenager, methinks.

Brett Ritchie

Brett Ritchie is the other less than obvious option to place on Krejci’s wing. He was acquired by the Boston Bruins this summer through free agency and is a player that certainly has potential, but we’re not too sure it screams second-line potential.

In the 2016-17 season with the Dallas Stars, he did manage 16 goals across his 78 games, however adding just 8 assists to that says to us it really was his upper limit production-wise and was a little bit lucky, all things considered.

Now, maybe he surprises us all; shows up to training camp incredibly motivated and wins his spot. More likely is that he fights with Backes for a fourth-line role, possibly even sharing it with him depending on the opposition throughout the season.

The most likely choice: Charlie Coyle

Whilst Charlie Coyle did impress as the third-line center this post-season just gone, he has shown on his previous team, the Minnesota Wild, that he is more than capable of sitting higher in the line-up.

Now obviously it does weaken the Boston Bruins a little bit down the center by promoting their third-line option, but they can fix that, possibly using new signing Par Lindholm or maybe giving Sean Kuraly just rewards for a strong year.

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Coyle offers both size and a bit of energy that would be a near-perfect match alongside DeBrusk and Krejci. His best NHL season saw him bag 18 goals and provide 38 asissts for a total of 56 points; if he could get anywhere near that sort of level suddenly Boston has two lines givign ample production to compete.

Given how stacked the Atlantic Division is looking to be this season, it’s going to be vital to step it up production-wise and Coyle, out of all the internal options and ignoring any of the young guns stepping up to the plate, fits the role the best.

We did see him struggle when he first arrived with the team, before finding chemistry with Marcus Johansson. However, having now no doubt bonded (in defeat unfortunately) with the locker-room, perhaps finding chemistry with new line-mates shouldn’t prove as big of an ask.

Give him the chance to succeed on the second line and I think he will. If not, keep him on the third line and hedge your bets that someone steps up to the mark.

Last year, nobody truly did and it affected Krejci and DeBrusk – the Boston Bruins need a right-winger to ensure the absolute best results out of their second liners. They can find it internally; it’s just a case of who?