Hip hip hooray? Not quite yet
Marchand doesn't feel his game is all way back
For those used to seeing Brad Marchand seemingly do just about anything he wants with the puck for years, this season has been different.
Instead of contorting defensemen with sublime dekes on a nightly basis, the Bruins’ first line left wing — who is coming off double hip surgery in the summer — is more often than not fighting the puck. Sometimes his seam passes don’t get through to his intended target. The 50-50 battles that he almost always won are tougher now.
But while Marchand’s game is still missing some of the wow factor, the job is still getting done. With 54 games under his belt, Marchand is a perfect pointper-game player (19-35-54). When any given game is up for grabs, Marchand is still often in the middle of tipping it in the B’s favor, like when he carried onetime Norris Trophy winner Adam Fox on his hip behind the net to set up Patrice Bergeron’s eventual gamewinning goal in last Saturday’s win over the Rangers.
Yet Marchand believes there’s another level he can still reach. Speaking after Wednesday’s practice, Marchand conceded that he’s not as far along as he’d like or expected to be from the offseason surgery. He knows as well as anyone what he’s capable of doing, and he’s not there yet.
“I thought I’d feel better now than I do, to be honest with you,” said Marchand. “It’s been really relieving that we have the team we have and we’re as deep as we are, because it definitely takes pressure off. But I thought I’d be where I was last year right now. I don’t necessarily feel like that. I still have a little ways to go before playoffs. But surgerywise, it was by far the best decision I made for the longevity of my career, so I’m happy with how it went.
And obviously the best case scenario happened and we have a really good team and it takes a lot of pressure off. But I thought it would be a little easier to get back to where I was last year than what’s it’s been.”
Marchand still feels there’s a conditioning level that he needs to get to in order to play the way he wants, the way to which he’s accustomed. Finding time to build conditioning work into an 82-game schedule is not easy but, he said, he has to chip away it at it every day. Physical fatigue can morph into mental fatigue.
“There are certain battles that I’ve lost that I typically will come out of the corners with, plays that I see that I’m just not connecting on, where normally I’ll have a little more patience or whether I’m forcing it a half-second too quick or a half-second too late,” said Marchand. “There are plays that I’m forcing at the wrong times and not seeing things quick enough in order to make it. Part of that comes with conditioning. When you start getting tired, you stop thinking as quick. That’s always where I felt I started to improve, when my conditioning level was at a certain point where I could make plays later in a shift, where other guys were tired.”
But not only has Marchand’s legendary competitiveness helped to keep his production levels at a more than respectable rate while he goes though these challenges, coach Jim Montgomery sees the bar for which he’s set for himself is pushing him through.
“He’s a star in the league,” said Montgomery. “When you’ve been one of, if not the best left wings in the league for the past seven years or so, you expect a lot of yourself, you hold yourself to a high standard. He’s kind of a microcosm of our team, right? He expects a lot from himself. Our team expects a lot from ourselves, and he knows his individual success helps drive the team success. So I think it’s one of those thing where he’s accustomed to 90 to 100 points for a season for a long time, and that’s what he holds himself accountable to. And he also kills penalties, he brings energy, he brings nastiness. He brings all those elements to what the Boston Bruins are.”
Marchand admitted to being frustrated at times with what he feels has been a slow process to get his game all the way back. At times in his career, Marchand has not always worn frustration well. But winning on a nightly basis helps. And Montgomery sees a maturity in his approach as well.
“I always relate coaching to parenting and I think I’m a much better parent on my fourth child than I was on my first child. You grow a little more patient. You let them fall down and you’re not there to pick them up every time they fall down. And I think players are the same way,” said Montgomery. “They go through their career, they’ve got to earn the respect of the league, then they become big-time players in the league. And then they realize, ‘How do I continue to grow?’ ”
If Marchand can continue to get pieces f his game back, the B’s will be that much more formidable when the playoffs come.
Powerful switch
As expected, Montgomery made some changes to the struggling power play, replacing Charlie McAvoy on the top unit with Dmitry Orlov and using McAvoy and Hampus Lindholm together on the second unit.
“We have the opportunity to experiment, so we’re experimenting,” said Montgomery.
Loose pucks
While Montgomery said he’ll give Bergeron and David Krejci games off down the stretch, he doesn’t anticipate he’ll do it this weekend after the team had four days off. … Believe it or not, the B’s can clinch a playoff spot with a win over the Oilers on Thursday and if the Sabres, Islanders and Senators all lose in regulation.