Boston Bruins: Is Jake DeBrusk finally turning a corner?
Jake DeBrusk is on a four-game point streak; his longest this season for the Boston Bruins. Thankfully, he’s finally seeming to find his game.
While a four-game point streak may not seem like much, for the Boston Bruins it’s great to find some regular second-line point production. For Jake DeBrusk, it’s a relief after a season where he’s underwhelmed way too often.
With 7 points in 4 games, 3 of which were goals (including the game-winner over Winnipeg); it’s clear that Jake DeBrusk is certainly brimming with confidence right about now.
Perhaps telling is that his ice-time has gradually increased; in part due to power-play usage, but also it’s a sign that he’s winning back the trust of Boston Bruins head coach, Bruce Cassidy. Since a lowly 13:37 night against Edmonton, his ice-time has read 15:59, 16:25, 16:24 and last night’s shoot-out loss saw 17:45.
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Now, you could make many arguments as to why his game has turned around and part of it has to be having a consistent set of line-mates.
The Boston Bruins have united Jake DeBrusk with David Krejci and Anders Bjork lately and they’ve seemingly started to mesh – a Corsi For score of 53.8% at even-strength represented the team’s strongest line against the Flyers, by that measure.
In what is his contract year, there’s little doubt that Jake DeBrusk would’ve hoped to top last year’s 42 points or his career-best 43 from his debut season. He is currently tracking to be able to manage this with 27 points so far, but he needs to maintain his current momentum.
It does seem clear that right now, his confidence levels are sky-high and that he could quite easily maintain this rich vein of form.
If he can do that, the Boston Bruins are a much stronger team, as suddenly the second line becomes a threatening offensive weapon and we’re not over-reliant upon the likes of David Pastrnak, Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand to dig us out of trouble on any given night.
With this continued good form though comes the double-edged sword. If he does top his career-best and push closer (or even above) the fifty-point mark, there’s every chance he may ask for more money in his contract negotiations.
Hence, do we want Jake DeBrusk in top form or just ticking along with the odd goal here and there. Such is the dilemma of the salary cap league!
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I’d take the point production any day personally; I’m just glad that it seems he has turned a corner and is now producing like the player we expected him to be. It’s hard to be over-critical of a 23 year-old in the final year of his first contract, but this is the new order of the NHL!