The Boston Bruins had 12 players join European clubs during the lockout, which is more than most NHL teams. (For example, Vancouver had just three, and none of them stars.)
Included among the Boston 12 were key players Zdeno Chara, Tyler Seguin, Patrice Bergeron, David Krejci and Tuukka Rask.
As such, B’s president Cam Neely thinks his team is primed for a fast start.
“I don’t want to come out and say we’re set up better, but it is beneficial for us that a number of our players have been playing in Europe and actually playing very well,” Neely said, as per the Boston Herald. “We had both goaltenders (Rask and Anton Khudobin) playing over there at some point, which is a big plus. So, yeah, from that perspective of having such a large number of guys who’ve been playing in games, it is certainly helpful.”
Granted, not every Bruin is already in game shape. Forward Milan Lucic admitted yesterday that it’ll take some time to “shake the rust off.”
“It definitely was difficult [to stay motivated] when [the NHL] canceled the entire month of November,” Lucic told CSNNE.com. “It was really hard. It came to a point where I decided to step back from the ice a bit because I felt like I was hurting myself rather than helping myself.”
In a related story…