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If there was any concern about how much David Pastrnak’s thumb injury would impact his game, those worries have been put to bed. In the five games since his return, Pastrnak has five goals and six assists.
With the questions around his hand no more, the next question involving Pastrnak is with what line should he play with.
The Bergeron line? The Krejci line?
After Pastrnak’s five-point game Wednesday—that included his third hat trick of the season—everyone wants a turn with Pastrnak on their wing.
“[Noel] Acciari and [Joakim] Nordstrom were asking for Pasta too by the end, so generally when a guy’s feeling it, I don’t think he cares where he plays, and Pasta was feeling it tonight,” Cassidy said following the Bruins 6-3 victory over the New York Rangers at TD Garden.
In the contest, Cassidy deployed a handful of different line combinations. Now that Pastrnak and Marcus Johansson are back, the Bruins are as close to having their full cavalry of forwards as they’ve been in a long time.
As of Wednesday night, six games remained on the Bruins schedule. With not much game action left to move pieces around and see who fits best where, Cassidy was forced to tinker with his lines. But whether it was with Bergeron and Brad Marchand, or Krejci and Jake DeBrusk, or on the power play, Pastrnak made an impact.
“Well, it’s a short window of opportunity here with the full forward group. Obviously, [Sean] Kuraly isn’t a part of that and won’t be in the next little while,” said Cassidy. “But Johansson coming in, so you’re almost trying to get a look at him everywhere. That was all.”
Pastrnak started the game with Bergeron and Marchand, skating together for 5:10 of 5v5 ice time. All of Pastrnak’s success 5v5 came when he was to the right of Krejci and DeBrusk. The three skated together for 7:03 of 5v5 ice time, with Pastrnak and DeBrusk each scoring one 5v5 goal.
Even though Pastrnak was at his best 5v5 playing on the Krejci line, and as much as Cassidy liked their line together, the coach is unsure where Pastrnak will start Saturday afternoon when the Bruins host the Florida Panthers.
“Like I said, I think Krech [Krejci] and DeBrusk lately have been a little bit stagnant, so put Pasta up there gives them a different look,” said Cassidy. “I did like what they did together. I don’t know. I don’t know Saturday if we’ll stick with it, to be perfectly honest. We’ll look at it again. Usually video will tell you a few things on maybe there’s some chemistry with certain guys that you don’t see during the course of the game.”
If DeBrusk’s excitement after he connected with Pastrnak on his 24th goal of the season is any indication, DeBrusk wants the benefit of having Pastrnak on his wing.
After tackling Pastrnak to the ice, DeBrusk is happy the Bruins leader in goals is okay.
“I was actually really concerned. When we were on the ground there I tried to make eye contact with him to make sure he was okay,” said a smiling DeBrusk. “Obviously just emotions but I’ve actually done that in the past before but not the same result. So it was nice to see him score after that and nice to be part of a goal as well.”
There’s no wrong answer to the question of where should Pastrnak play, Pastrnak is going to find success wherever he lands.
In 272:23 of 5v5 ice time with Krejci this season, Pastrnak and Krejci have a corsi for percentage of 57.39% and a goals for percentage of 64%. In 464:28 of 5v5 ice time with Begeron and Pastrnak together, the two have a corsi for percentage of 57.08% and a goals for percentage of 57.69%.
Pastrnak has experience playing with all four forwards he skated with Wednesday. For him, it doesn’t matter which line he is out there with, as long as the team continues to win hockey games.
“Yeah, I mean, I had to bounce around two lines, but nothing that is new for me. I’ve been playing on both of these lines for a while, so I know what to expect from all four guys,” said Pastrnak. “To be honest I’m very happy for the two points and just to be back at home ice and we’ve still got to go and try to get ready for the playoffs so we are at our best hockey when it starts.”
With Pastrnak finding success on the Krejci line, Johansson got a brief look on the Bergeron line, and I would like to see more of that on Saturday.
The only issue I have with that is with Johansson on your top line, the third line of Danton Heinen, Charlie Coyle and Chris Wagner can easily be exposed, especially against a Maple Leafs team that is deep with three solid lines of forwards.
In 31:18 of 5v5 ice time together, the three have been outshot by four, and outscored by one while have a minus-21 corsi rating.
Where Pastrnak eventually slots in and how the four lines will look when the playoffs begin remains to be seen. These next five games and what matchups Cassidy prefers will dictate that. But don’t be surprised to see Cassidy get a little crazy with his combinations in the coming days.
Torey Krug return immediately boots Bruins’ power play
Last week I touched upon
how important Krug is to the Bruins power play and where he ranks among some of the league’s best power play specialists. If you’re an eye test type of person, Wednesday’s contest was all you needed to see.
The Bruins finished the night with four goals in six power play tries, with three of those goals coming with Krug on the ice.
The Bruins’ power play looked much more fluid with Krug on the ice. Their zone entries were clean, and the puck movement in the offensive zone created scoring chance after scoring chance.
Jake DeBrusk goals mean good things
I love stats.
The Bruins numbers when DeBrusk scores a goal is flat out silly. Give the man the puck!
Boston Bruins Blogger • 
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