Bruce Cassidy comments on his roster shake up ahead of Game 2 (VIDEO)
Boston Bruins head coach Bruce Cassidy announced Tuesday morning that Linus Ullmark will start again and that he will be making just one roster shake-up for game two against the Carolina Hurricanes.
Cassidy's only move is switching Hampus Lindholm and Matthew Grzelcyk in the top two defence pairings so that it will look like this:
Grzelcyk - McAvoy
Lindholm - Carlo
Lindholm - Carlo
Apparently, Cassidy wanted to try a Lindholm, and Carlo pairing earlier in the season but wasn't able to when Lindholm missed some time with an injury. It's no surprise he wants to put Grzelcyk and McAvoy back together, though.
For defence pairings that played a minimum of 400 minutes together in the 2021-22 NHL regular season. McAvoy and Grzelcyk led the league in Expected Goals % (the probability of any shot taken to result in a goal), Expected Goals Against, Expected Goals Against Per 60 minutes, and Expected Goals For Per 60 minutes.
So basically, McAvoy and Grzelcyk were THE best d-pairing in the entire NHL in producing scoring chances for the Bruins, and limiting scoring chances against the Bruins when they were on the ice together.
Cassidy's thoughts on why he switched things up:
"I just Grizz and Carlo had a bit of a challenging night. We talked about using Lindholm with Carlo at times as well. It also allows you to, in-game, put Lindholm and McAvoy together maybe after they've sat a shift ... so you can still keep them as a pair ... Grizz has played a lot of hockey with McAvoy; they're a good pair."
Hear what else Bruce Cassidy had to say about his roster shake-up ahead of game two below:
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