By Ty Anderson, 985TheSportsHub.com
The Boston Bruins finally wrapped up their restricted free agent Monday with the signing of winger Jake DeBrusk to a two-year contract worth $7.35 million ($3.675 million cap hit), B’s general manager Don Sweeney announced.
DeBrusk’s new deal comes after a 2019-20 campaign that featured 19 goals and 35 points in 65 regular-season contests, and three goals in 10 games during Boston’s 2020 Stanley Cup Playoff run inside the Toronto bubble.
Considered Boston’s third-best wing behind Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak, DeBrusk recorded a career-high in 27 goals in 2018-19, but is still looking to work out some obvious consistency issues, as noted in year-end availability.
“I feel confident in my play, I feel confident in how I can help this team, [and] I know what kind of player I can be,” DeBrusk said in September. “And this year I don’t think it could be replicated to be honest with you. I mean for how the common perception is, you know I’m still one goal away from 20 goals and that’s one thing I looked at you know once the first pause happened was I felt like I was completely different than what I guess that said. It’s not easy to do in this league but I definitely have a lot better and I haven’t even really tuned into that yet, which is frustrating, but I think that these learning experiences from my struggles have really helped me or will help me as a pro when I continue on here.”
The 14th overall pick from the 2015 NHL Draft, DeBrusk ranks fourth on the Bruins in goals (62), fourth in power-play goals (17), third in game-winning goals (14), sixth in points (120) and eighth in assists (58) since jumping to the NHL in 2017.
DeBrusk’s new deal gives the Bruins just under $3 million in projected available cap space.
