Boston Bruins: Can Jaroslav Halak repeat his 2018-19 form?

When you look at the Boston Bruins acquisition of Jaroslav Halak last season, it was a very smart move.

Question is can Jaroslav Halak bring the same form this season that, at times, saw him claim clear ownership of the Boston Bruins’ net over Tuukka Rask?

When he inked a two-year deal with the Boston Bruins last season, Jarsolav Halak was coming off an average year with the New York Islanders, claiming just 20 wins off 53 games and posting a below-average 0.908 save percentage and 3.22 goals against average. You’d safely look at those statistics and say he was coming to Boston purely in a backup role.

However once he got here, he proceeded to surprise us all and finished the season having essentially shared the net with 2,308 minutes to Tuukka Rask’s 2,635 – few would’ve expected 300 minutes to be the difference between the goaltender’s at the end of the year.

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It’s quite possible that Rask’s great post-season play was resultant of the Boston Bruins not having to rely as heavily on him in the regular season.

Perhaps the big concern for the Boston Bruins now is that Halak’s successful year was an outlier and he won’t be able to repeat the same form this year. His 0.922 save percentage actually, ignoring his years with the New York Islanders, looks to be around the range we should expect from that number of games.

Likewise, his goals against average of 2.34 holds up, purely based on the defensive group ahead of him likely remaining consistent, pending the re-signing of both restricted free agents, Brandon Carlo and Charlie McAvoy, of course.

Telling of his consistency last year was the number of quality starts he tallied. A quality start is defined as a ‘game with a save percentage above the league average’ or ‘a game with fewer than 20 shots and a save percentage above .885’. Of Jaroslav Halak’s 40 games last season, 23 were defined as quality starts; 22 eventuated in wins.

Every bit of statistical evidence suggests that in the Boston Bruins, Jaroslav Halak found a team that seemingly restored his confidence and he should have zero issue with repeating his form.

Halak performed beyond his career average this past season and hopefully is able to back it up. A lot of this will also depend on Rask; if he struggles immediately to find form again it will open the door for the Slovak to once again mount his claim for the starting role.

It was the difference-maker for Jaroslav last season and although we don’t wish bad form on any player, would be beneficial in the long-run to another successful Boston Bruins season if they have two in-form goalies fighting for ice-time once again!

We assume he can repeat his form; his career statistics do have their peaks and troughs but he hasn’t truly dived off the cliff, aside from his final year in New York that actually meant he was available at a reasonable price for Boston.

The Bruins are early on-board with the new idea of splitting goalie time evenly; let’s hope he gives them plenty of reason to once again this coming year.