The Boston Bruins are 13-11-0 and will be holding onto the final Eastern Conference wild card spot when they take to the ice on Wednesday night on Long Island to play the New York Islanders in the final game of their four-game road trip.
They will show up the night before Thanksgiving shorthanded with Casey Mittlestadt, Viktor Arvidsson, and Charlie McAvoy on injured reserve. That is a lot of production that Marco Sturm is missing from his lineup. Somehow, they have hung around the postseason picture in the East.
Morgan Geekie has a team-high 17 goals, and he is single-handedly carrying the Black and Gold on their road trip with five goals in three games. He scored both in a 2-1 overtime win over the Los Angeles Kings on Friday night. If the Bruins are going to survive this stretch minus some of their top players, they are going to need players not named Morgan Geekie and David Pastrnak to step up. Here are three that need to supply more offensively.
Pavel Zacha
A topic of trade rumors already this year, Pavel Zacha has been moved around by Sturm in the top six. On Sunday night against the San Jose Sharks, he was centering the top line in Elias Lindholm's return from injured reserve. This season, Zacha has five goals and 12 assists, but the Bruins would like to see the goal number go up.
The 12 assists are nice, but Boston really needs that goal number to go up. Playing in all situations, killing penalties takes a lot out of given the number of penalties the Bruins are taking, but if he were able to increase his goals, it would be very beneficial to the Black and Gold.
Elias Lindholm
Center Elias Lindholm has missed 10 games after being injured by Buffalo Sabres forward Jordan Greenway on Oct. 30. He returned against the Sharks and gutted his way through the game. It was nice to have him back, but now it's time for him to start providing more offense now that he has a game under him.
He has five goals and nine points in 14 games, and when he came back against San Jose, he centered the second line. Now that he has a game under his belt, moving up to the top line with Geekie and Pastrnak is the move to make. They played well together before he was injured, and the results when Geekie and Pastrnak play together make too much sense. Elias Lindholm producing more offense would be ideal.
Hampus Lindholm
With Charlie McAvoy out for who knows how long, he was playing incredible hockey with 14 assists in 19 games before taking a deflected puck to the face against the Montreal Canadiens a few weeks ago. Boston is in dire need of offense from their defense, and Hampus Lindholm is its best option for that.
The defensive group is very thin without McAvoy, and Hampus Lindholm must remain healthy and start producing offensively. In 16 games, he had one goal and six assists, and he is an extremely gifted offensive player, but Boston needs something from their backend, and Lindholm is likely the best option to provide that.