Season Review #13: Boston Bruins - Last in the East a Year Ago, Back in the Playoffs This Year, Swayman a Vezina Finalist, Nine Debutants, McAvoy Played Through a Broken Hand, and 0-3 at Home When It Counted

They were a 200-to-1 Cup longshot in September. They tied Carolina for the most home wins in the league. Jeremy Swayman was one of three Vezina Trophy finalists. Nine players made their playoff debuts. Charlie McAvoy broke his hand in Game 2 and didn't miss a shift. They lost all three home playoff games to the Buffalo Sabres. The season was better than the exit suggests. The exit is still the exit.

By Mike Holloway · May 2026 · 2025–26 Season Review Series · Playoff Teams

Last in the East. Sold Marchand. 200-to-1 Cup Odds. Then: A Playoff Appearance, a Vezina Finalist, and the NHL's Best Home Record.

In the summer of 2025, the Boston Bruins sold off Brad Marchand, their captain, their most important forward of the last decade, the player most associated with the franchise's identity in the post-Bergeron era, and half a dozen other contributors at the trade deadline. They finished with 76 points, tied with the Philadelphia Flyers for last in the Eastern Conference. The preseason over-under for 2025-26 was set at 80.5 points. Cup odds were listed at 200-to-1.

McAvoy attended the NHL media tour in Las Vegas in September and told anyone who would listen that Boston would make the playoffs. "I think we surprised a lot of people," McAvoy said after the season ended. He was right. He had also told them in advance. The season produced what he promised: a playoff appearance, 29 regular-season home wins tied with Carolina for the most in the NHL, a Vezina Trophy finalist in goal, nine players making their postseason debuts, and a first-round series against the Buffalo Sabres that ended 4-2. McAvoy broke his right hand in Game 2 and didn't miss a shift.

Swayman finished the regular season 31-18-4 with a 2.71 goals-against average and .908 save percentage in 54 games, numbers that earned him a Vezina Trophy nomination as one of the NHL's three best goaltenders. He allowed 14 goals on 156 shots through the first five games of the Buffalo series, a .910 save percentage in the context of a team that was beaten at even strength in most meaningful situations. He was pulled in Game 4 after a 6-1 loss, not because he was the reason for the result but because the scoreline demanded a change, and he visibly expressed frustration at his teammates as he left the ice. They responded. He won Game 5 in overtime. He made 22 saves in Game 6 in a game where his team scored one goal. "The Bruins being ousted had nothing to do with goaltending," NHL.com stated in its elimination analysis. It was the correct conclusion.

The home playoff record is the specific failure that the goaltending analysis cannot explain. The Bruins tied Carolina, the team that won the Stanley Cup with a 16-3 postseason record, for the most home wins in the NHL regular season (29). They then lost all three of their home playoff games at TD Garden. Won both games in Buffalo. Went 2-4 overall. The ability to win in their own building in October through April, and the inability to replicate it in April in the same building, is one of the stranger specific results of the entire 2026 playoffs. No clear structural explanation covers it. The opponent was competitive but not dominant. The goaltending was fine. The even-strength play at home in the playoffs was simply worse than it had been all season in the same circumstances.

Buffalo 4, Boston 2, The Paradox of Home Ice

The series' defining paradox: Boston went 2-0 in Buffalo and 0-3 in Boston. They won every road game and lost every home game. Mason Lohrei, who had 26 points and was +17 in the regular season, was removed from the lineup after three games (minus-4, zero points) and replaced by Harris and Jokiharju. Arvidsson (25 regular-season goals) was injured in Game 4 and missed the final two. McAvoy's broken hand from Game 2 was not disclosed until the season ended, he played four games with a fractured right hand. Zadorov tore his MCL in Game 3 and played through it. Three significant injuries, none of them used as post-series excuses. "Everybody poured everything they had into this season," McAvoy said. The evidence was visible in the medical reports disclosed on the final day.

2025–26 Individual Season Grades

31-18-4 · 2.71 GAA · .908 SV% · 54 GP · Vezina Trophy finalist · not the reason for the exit

The Vezina nomination is the honest assessment of Swayman's regular season, one of the three best goaltenders in the NHL. His playoff numbers (2.91 GAA, .906 SV%) are not the reason the Bruins lost. NHL.com said explicitly that his performance was not the factor in the elimination. The A-minus rather than a full A is for a season that ended in Round 1, which carries individual weight regardless of cause. As an individual: he was elite and named a finalist for the sport's top goaltending honour. That is what an A-minus looks like.

Led the team in scoring · reliable offensive presence all season · steady on a transitional roster

Pastrnak is the franchise's most important offensive player and has been every season since Bergeron retired. In 2025-26, on a roster that sold its captain and half its depth the prior season, he provided the offensive consistency that made the turnaround possible. The grade is for a reliable individual campaign that did not flash the career-best form of some prior seasons but was exactly what the organisation needed from its most important forward. "We didn't achieve nothing," he said. He was right, and his production was the primary reason.

Told the world in September Boston would make the playoffs · broke his hand in G2 · did not miss a shift

The most important individual story of the 2025-26 Bruins season is a defensive captain who publicly predicted the playoffs when everyone around him was booking rebuild season tickets, then played four games in the Stanley Cup Playoffs with a fractured right hand without telling anyone. Both facts reflect the same thing: a player whose confidence in his team is total and whose pain threshold in their service is exceptional. The A-minus is for leading this specific group to this specific result from the position he started from a year ago.

Shuffled to third line in lineup changes · scored unassisted to tie G5 · two goals in series

The series MVP might have been Swayman but the player who kept the season alive was Lindholm, the unassisted tying goal in Game 5 set up the overtime win in Buffalo that extended the series. He accepted a third-line demotion in the playoff lineup changes without complaint and scored from the new position. He is 29 and the kind of reliable, two-way centre that winning playoff teams need in significant roles. His 2026-27 role, with a year of this roster's identity established, should be clarified early in training camp.

Torn MCL in G3 · played through it anyway · embodies the character of the 2025-26 group

He tore his MCL in Game 3 of the playoff series. He kept playing. The medical disclosure came after the season ended. His offseason recovery will determine his availability for training camp 2026-27. The grade is for what he did in the regular season as a legitimate top-four defenceman and for what he did in the series despite the injury, which is the same thing McAvoy did with his hand, and which tells you something about the culture Marc Sturm built in Year One that the team would not stop competing through injuries they weren't obligated to disclose.

First-year coach · took last-in-East to playoff team · nine debutants in the postseason · 29 home wins

He inherited a roster that had sold its captain and lost multiple key contributors at the prior season's deadline. He delivered a playoff team. The playoff exit is the grade's ceiling, not its floor. A first-year head coach who turns a 76-point team into a 29-home-win team, fields nine playoff debutants, and earns a Vezina nomination for his goaltender is a coach whose Year One is a genuine success by any honest metric. Year Two will determine whether this is a trajectory or a ceiling.

No. 7 pick · 2025 Draft · 19 years old · made playoff debut in first NHL season

The most important individual development piece on the roster. A 19-year-old first-round pick playing in the Stanley Cup Playoffs in his first professional season is the evidence that the teardown produced what it was designed to produce. Hagens is not the finished article, that is not a realistic expectation at 19, but the fact that he was there, in meaningful postseason minutes, is the signal that the next three to four Boston seasons have a genuine foundation to build from. The grade is for his trajectory, not his current output.

The narrative of the 2025-26 Boston Bruins is the narrative of a franchise that, having sold its identity in the prior offseason, rebuilt one in twelve months. Not a championship identity. A competitive identity. A team that tied the eventual Stanley Cup champions for the most home wins in the league. A team that put nine players in the Stanley Cup Playoffs who had never been there before. A team whose captain played four postseason games with a broken hand without disclosing it. A team whose goaltender was named a Vezina Trophy finalist on his way out of the playoffs.

The Round 1 exit is the fair result. The Bruins were not a deep team. The home playoff performance (0-3 at TD Garden) is the specific failure that the season's best individual result, 29 home regular-season wins, makes more confusing rather than less. The injuries (McAvoy, Zadorov, Arvidsson) accumulated at the worst time. The series result was accurate to the teams involved. What was not accurate to the teams involved was the preseason expectation of 80.5 points and 200-to-1 Cup odds. McAvoy told them they were wrong in September. The season proved it. The first round proved the market's revised estimate, a genuine playoff team, not yet a genuine contender, more correct than his. The gap between those two is where the next phase of Boston hockey is written.

Browse the full set at Season Reviews. Previous in series: #14 Edmonton Oilers.