Boston Bruins
A stout showing from Jeremy Swayman and a punishing forecheck will help Boston’s fortunes in the first round of the playoffs.
Nikita Zadorov doled out plenty of damage against the Sabres earlier this season. (Ken McGagh for The Boston Globe)
For the first time since 2011, the Buffalo Sabres are back in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
The Boston Bruins hope to make it an abbreviated postseason stint for their Atlantic Division foe.
Boston will take on Buffalo in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs — with Game 1 set for Sunday at KeyBank Center.
Buffalo might have momentum and home-ice advantage on its side, but the Bruins — who went 3-1-0 against the Sabres during regular-season play — have some advantages going into this series.
“I think our teams are built maybe a little bit differently, in terms of they’re a little smaller and faster, and we’re probably bigger and heavier,” Casey Mittelstadt said Thursday. “I think it will be a good contrast of that. I think it’s a good matchup for us. …. It is going to be a battle either way.”
Here are four things the Bruins must do if they want to shut down the Sabres:
Swayman must stand tall
You can harp on all of the baseline stats, underlying metrics, star power, depth, momentum, etc.
When it comes to playoff hockey, there’s no greater equalizer than strong goaltending.
And if Jeremy Swayman is up to the task, the Bruins have to like their odds in this best-of-seven series.
Swayman should be in consideration for a Vezina Trophy this spring — oftentimes masking a shaky defensive structure from Boston in 2025-26.
Swayman went 31-18-4 with a .908 save percentage and 2.71 goals-against average in an encouraging bounce-back campaign — with his goals saved above expected rate of 28.8 ranking second in the league among qualified goalies behind only Washington’s Logan Thompson (29.3).
The Bruins’ top netminder has relished his reps against Buffalo over the years — sporting an 8-1-1 record in his career against the Sabres with a .925 save percentage.
Buffalo’s goaltending has also been strong this season, with both Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen and Alex Lyon splitting reps between the pipes.
Luukkonen ended the year on a high note, going 11-2-1 with a .918 save percentage after the Olympics. But, Boston got the better of the 27-year-old goalie in their last meeting, scoring four goals against him off 31 shots in a comeback win in Buffalo on March 25.
Luukkonen — who ranks 17th in the NHL in goal saved above expected (10.5) — has also never appeared in a postseason game.
The last time Swayman was in the playoffs in 2024, he all but carried Boston to a first-round victory over the Maple Leafs — while also pushing the eventual Stanley Cup champion Panthers to six games in the next round.
Swayman closed out that playoff run with a sterling .933 save percentage across 12 games. While his playoff run came to an end in the second round, his 13.3 goals saved above expected that postseason still led all goalies in playoff action.
If Swayman puts together a similar performance this postseason, he can cover up several other shortcomings across Boston’s roster.
Boston’s top line needs to wake up
The Sabres roll out one of the deepest forward groups in the Eastern Conference, with Tage Thompson, Josh Norris, and Ryan McLeod each centering a line with plenty of skill and scoring punch.
If Boston wants to stay off the ropes at 5-on-5 play, they’re going to need to counter-punch with some offensive contributions up and down its lineup.
Boston’s second line of Pavel Zacha, Casey Mittelstadt, and Viktor Arvidsson has been a 5-on-5 buzzsaw all season long — outscoring opponents, 42-22, in 583 minutes of game action.
A bruising fourth line of Sean Kuraly, Tanner Jeannot, and Mark Kastelic seems to be heating up. The trio combined for four goals and 10 total points in their last two games.
And, a third line of elder statesmen in 21-year-old Fraser Minten, 23-year-old Marat Khusnutdinov, and 19-year-old James Hagens might be Boston’s top X-factor if that trio can spark some offense further down the depth chart.
But, Boston’s 5-on-5 offense is going to take a significant hit if the Bruins’ first line of David Pastrnak, Morgan Geekie, and Elias Lindholm continues to sputter.
Any forward grouping featuring an offensive juggernaut in Pastrnak and a 39-goal scorer like Geekie ought to decidedly tilt the ice in Boston’s favor. But, that hasn’t been the case this season.
In that grouping’s 348 minutes of 5-on-5 reps this season, the Bruins have actually been outscored, 19-16.
Geekie’s recent scoring surge (five goals in his last four games) is a welcome sight after he went 17 games without a tally from March 7 to April 5. But, if this line continues to be stuck in neutral, Marco Sturm will once again need to reshuffle his lines in order to keep Boston’s offense humming.
If Buffalo’s top defensive pairing of Rasmus Dahlin and Mattias Samuelsson can successfully bottle up Boston’s top forwards, spreading the wealth out across the Bruins’ lineup stands as the next course of action.
Tilt the ice during special teams
This series might come down to which team’s power play finally decides to wake up.
Boston’s power play was a consistent avenue of offense for most of the year, with assistant coach Steve Spott overhauling a unit that consistently cashed in on its opportunities from October through early February.
But, after holding court as a top-five power play for most of the season, Boston’s man advantage has flatlined since returning from the Olympic break.
The Bruins’ power play — which closed out the season ranked ninth in the league (23.4) — only converted on 16.2 percent of its chances after the Milano-Cortina Games, ranking just 28th in the league over that stretch.
Getting that power play back online is a priority for Spott and Co., with Hagens’ skating ability and knack for generating clean zone entries worth monitoring if the rookie draws into the lineup.
But, the Sabres aren’t exactly the type of team that makes life easy on the man advantage. Buffalo’s PK ranks fourth in the NHL — negating 82.1 percent of opposing power plays — while their 10 shorthanded goals are the third-most in the league.
Even if Boston’s power play labors in this series, the Bruins’ knack for ending up in the penalty box may not burn them, given that Buffalo’s own power play has largely been pedestrian.
The Sabres have only capitalized on 19.8 percent of their power plays, ranking 19th in the league. They’ve been even worse down the final stretch of the season, with only the Kraken and Blackhawks faring worse on the power play than Buffalo (14.0 percent) since March 9.
There’s plenty of talent on both Boston and Buffalo’s power-play groupings. Whichever one starts to find traction could go a long way toward determining who punches their ticket to the next round.
Tenderize puck carriers
Cam Neely’s preseason decree that the Bruins were going to be a “tough out” and play with “piss and vinegar” has largely manifested itself out on the ice.
The Bruins might boast plenty of postseason experience and some high-end talent at critical spots on the roster. But, Boston’s willingness to dole out plenty of pain against the opposition has been one of the galvanizing factors in the Bruins’ turnaround.
With players like Mark Kastelic, Tanner Jeannot, and Nikita Zadorov on the prowl, teams facing the Bruins tend to stock up on ice bags before games at TD Garden.
When Sturm’s club is dialed in, retrieving pucks and ferrying the puck through the neutral zone is more akin to navigating a minefield against Boston.
Over the course of a seven-game series, Boston’s bruising forechecking pressure and willingness to finish their hits could significantly wear down a talented Buffalo D corps that may be looking over their shoulders with some trepidation as this first-round series matchup carries on.
Much like how the Florida Panthers carved out an unexpected playoff run in 2023 by hammering skaters into the glass and forcing turnovers, the Bruins will need to follow a similar script against Buffalo — especially against D-men prone to miscues under pressure like Logan Stanley, Bowen Byram, and Owen Power.
It’s a punishing approach — one the Bruins will need to adhere to if they want to even the playing field against opponents boasting more talent and depth.
Given what we’ve seen so far this year, Boston should have no qualms about making life miserable for opponents.
Conor Ryan is a staff writer covering the Bruins, Celtics, Patriots, and Red Sox for Boston.com, a role he has held since 2023.
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