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If you asked me a month ago and told me to be as honest as humanly possible, I probably would have told you that I didn’t believe that
Ryan Spooner had a real future with the Boston Bruins.
In his first 32 games with the Black and Gold, primarily logged on the B’s third line, the former second-round pick had zero goals and 11 points. Those figures aren’t terrible, but they were far from great, and Spooner’s all-around game had remained a question mark, and serious knock against the 5-foot-10 centerman receiving calls back to Boston. He didn’t have a stellar training camp (
Claude Julien even called him a liability), the Bruins have always viewed him as a top-nine player (they weren’t going to give him the keys to the defense-first fourth line pivot spot), and his struggles to battle along the walls made the idea of utilizing him as anything but a center seemed like a dream.
So, in essence, unless Spooner could beat out
David Krejci,
Patrice Bergeron, or
Carl Soderberg for a spot on the NHL roster while improving his own-zone game, it was back down to the American Hockey League. And by the trade deadline, if you asked me, out of town.
(The Bruins reportedly offered Spooner to Buffalo as the centerpiece of a potential deal for Sabre-turned-Wild
Chris Stewart prior to both the Krejci injury and NHL Trade Deadline.)
But the opportunity knocked by way of a Krejci knee injury -- one that’s projected to keep No. 46 out of the lineup for four to six weeks -- and the 23-year-old Spooner hasn’t looked back.
In eight games with the Bruins since the Krejci injury, Spooner has recorded three goals and five assists, and has tallied at least one point in all but one of those eight contests. He’s also currently riding a six-game point streak, and has found a definite connection with
David Pastrnak.
It’s a small sample, no doubt, but when the Bruins have needed it, Spooner has been a contributor. And as the Bruins continue to expand their lead on the Eastern Conference’s second wild card spot, the idea of sitting Spooner if/when Krejci comes back for the regular season and postseason is becoming harder.
The biggest reason, of course, is his connection with Pastrnak and that line’s veteran,
Milan Lucic. Given the speed factor between Pastrnak and Spooner, Lucic has been forced to play more of a complete game, and cannot ‘coast’ through the offensive zone and simply bank off what Krejci can do with and without the puck on his blade in the attacking zone. Lucic has accepted the responsibility of this role, too, and there’s been a noticeable difference in his efforts through the defensive and neutral zones. And that’s without delving into the chemistry between Pastrnak and Spooner. These guys just seem to find a way to get the puck to one another, and have created numerous chances for their line.
“By playing together more and more it seems like they’re finding each other. I know they talk a lot on the bench – they get back and they talk about situations. So yeah to me basically it should be getting better all the time if they continue to take that approach,” Julien said about the Lucic-Spooner-Pastrnak trio last week. “I think [Milan Lucic] has really done a good job of stepping in with two young guys and kind of being the father figure, if you want to put it that way, and making sure that these guys feel comfortable out there and capable of playing their game.”
Now, the line does tend to get hemmed in their own end a bit too much for Julien’s liking, I’m sure, but their ability to thrive at the other end is offsetting that, at least for the time being.
Spooner’s also been able to carve out a niche as a solid presence on the Bruins’ top power play unit with Bergeron,
Loui Eriksson, and defensemen
Dougie Hamilton and
Torey Krug. On top of his creative, Savard-esque passing ability along the wall, Spooner’s been able to find the time and space to get his shot off on the man advantage, and picked up the first power-play goal of his career in Tuesday’s 3-1 victory over the Ottawa Senators.
That’s the warm and fuzzy stuff, though. At the end of the day, still, I don’t think that Spooner is a player that Julien would want to roll on a line expected to jam away in the corner and go against other teams’ fourth lines. More often than not, Spooner would get beaten down by more physical players. So sticking him on the fourth line as a power play specialist if/when Krejci comes back is an obvious no.
And Krejci, even at less than 100 percent, is not a bottom-sixer and it’d be tough to treat him as such. But could the Bruins afford to pull Lucic (a player that’s developed a lengthy-but-borderline-dependent rapport with Krejci since uniting on the Bruins’ top line in 2010) and Pastrnak away from Spooner? Given the effect it’s had on all three players, that’s become a legitimate question for the Black and Gold.
This has yet to touch on the trickiest part of this entire thing, and that’s just who would get the boot up to the press box as the healthy scratch when Krejci’s ready to return to the lineup.
In a perfect world, Julien and the Bruins could offset the idea of a first and third line by putting Krejci with Eriksson and Soderberg while keeping their current ‘first line’ intact. That would also drop
Chris Kelly down to the fourth line, but would force the Bruins to sit one of their three veteran fourth-liners in
Danny Paille,
Max Talbot, or
Gregory Campbell. Paille and Talbot seem like a pair that Julien would be reluctant to sit considering the fact that Talbot’s a noted playoff presence, while Paille has worked his way out of a five-month nightmare. And Campbell, though he’s been under the gun for his play all season long, is a player that Julien loves to have in his lineup.
No matter the call, it won’t be an easy one for a B’s bench boss that’s notorious for trusting his ‘guys’ when he needs them the most. At the same time, however, it’d be awfully tough to scratch the kid that’s undoubtedly received the message you sent him earlier this season (and then some).
But I suppose, like everything else this year, the Bruins will cross this bridge when they get there.
Ty Anderson has been covering the Boston Bruins for HockeyBuzz.com since 2010, is a member of the Pro Hockey Writers Association's Boston Chapter, and can be contacted on Twitter, or emailed at Ty.AndersonHB[at]gmail.com
Boston Bruins Blogger •Bruins Feature Columnist • 
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