Attending the Boston Bruins' Rookie Camp was a lose-lose situation for James Hagens. If he played well and dominated the Buffalo Sabres' prospects, people would say that anyone who played NHL playoff games last season should be doing that against a lackluster Buffalo roster. If he played poorly, people would say that he is yet another draft bust from Don Sweeney and shouldn't play in Boston this season.
Full disclosure, I was ready to criticize Hagens' game early in this matchup with the Sabres, as the start of his contest looked like someone who felt the pressure of trying to make the team out of training camp and was trying to do too much. When the Bruins' top prospect should've kept it simple and shown he could play in the system, he was trying to show that he was everything and more for Boston.
It was a slow start to Hagens' game, and then he took an offensive zone penalty when trying to reach in and force the issue with a defenseman carrying the puck out of the zone. Once he came out of the box, he tried to do too much again and attempted a 1-on-3 deke through the Sabres that ended up in a rush the other way. It was the kind of plays you could see leading to comments from Sweeney at the end of training camp, saying he still needed to go to Providence to learn the Bruins' way.
The good side of James Hagens' game
While the first period was a disaster, Hagens came out in the second period looking like the player that the Bruins took at seventh overall in 2025. He sniped a goal on the powerplay to get his first of the game, before besting that first effort with another top-corner fadeaway shot for his second goal on the man advantage.
Hagens with another snipe 6-2 B’s pic.twitter.com/A72gUmRSGa
— Robert Chalmers (@robbatwo) September 13, 2026
Hagens stayed much more composed through the rest of the game and played more in the system that Marco Sturm will ask of him over the next two weeks. If he brings the final two periods to the main training camp, it'd be hard to justify sending him to Providence, but he has to avoid too many moments like the ones that cast a bit of a black eye on him in the first period.
If Hagens hadn't shown enough of the Bruins' way through periods 2 and 3, he also got physically involved with a Sabres player before pushing him into the net and even dropping his gloves. It wasn't a fight by any means, but it did show a willingness to get involved in some physical play, which most didn't realize he had in his tool belt.
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