It is the first time since the 2001-2002 Florida Panthers that a single team has had the top two players in penalty minutes. Well, welcome the 2025 Boston Bruins, who had just that.
Nikita Zadorov and Mark Kastelic are one and two, respectively, in penalty minutes to end the 2025-2026 season. The only way this stat changes is if Logan Stanley of the Buffalo Sabres gets 14 or more penalty minutes in the last game of the season for the Sabres.
Does this speak to the play of the Boston Bruins?
So what does having the top two in penalties actually mean? In total, Zadorov and Kastelic have a total of 292 penalty minutes. Zadorov finished with 152 penalty minutes, and Kastelic finished with 140.
The physical play of the Bruins may be a test of the fact that these two have such high penalty minutes. Zadorov and Kastelic are both known for their physicality and brute strength. It can also attest to both of them taking careless penalties that plagued the Bruins this past season. Both of the two's most damning penalty that ran up their penalty minutes were their fighting majors, as well as roughing. Kastelic picked up 10 fighting majors, and Zadorov picked up five fighting majors.
First Time since the 2001-2002 Season
This marks the first time in 24 years that a team has gone one and two in penalty minutes. The Florida Panthers group of Peter Worrell and Brad Ference were the last two players to go one and two in penalty minutes. Worrell finished with 354, and Ference with 254. So at least the Bruins can say they do not have that bad a penalty problem.
What makes Zadorov being the leader in penalty minutes again this year hysterical is the fact that he said during the offseason that he wanted to cut back on his penalties and clean up his play. He finished with seven more penalty minutes than he did last season. Kastelic added 34 minutes to his total from last season.
Since the 2001-2002 season, there has also only been one season where the penalty minute leader was under 100 minutes. Every other year, the leader had over 100 minutes' worth of penalties.
Let's see if the 2026-2027 season will allow Zadorov to bring down those penalty minutes. If the trend so far has been adding minutes, he may be looking at being the league leader once again.
Add us as a preferred source on Google