Bruins finally acknowledge 2015 NHL Draft as a complete disaster

It’s been six years since the Bruins made back-to-back-to-back selections in the middle of the first round of the 2015 NHL Draft.

And fresh off a second-round exit, and with the player selected directly after the Bruins’ trio of picks playing a huge part in their elimination, Bruins president Cam Neely has come to terms with the fact that it was largely one big loss for the Bruins.

“I’ve looked back at that a lot, obviously,” Neely admitted Tuesday. “I think the timing of when we hired Don [Sweeney] and then the draft was taking place, [it] would have been good, I think, to have a little bit more time between the hiring and the draft. Not to say that Don wasn’t involved in the amateur meetings, but he wasn’t involved at the time, most of the time thinking that he was making the picks.”

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  By now, you know the names of the players selected after the Bruins nabbed Jakub Zboril, Jake DeBrusk, and Zach Senyshyn in that order with the B's triple-decker of mid-first round selections. But in case you need another reminder (or just love pain), there's Mat Barzal, Kyle Connor, Thomas Chabot, Joel Eriksson Ek, Colin White, Brock Boeser, Travis Konecny, Jack Roslovic, and Anthony Beauvillier. That’s just in the first round, by the way. (Sebastian Aho to the Carolina Hurricanes in the second round at No. 35 overall is like an extra kick in the prospects. Free of charge.) 
  
  That's a whole lot of talent left on the board by the Bruins and for everyone else's benefit, especially with neither Zboril nor Senyshyn looking like a full-time NHLer as they approach their mid-20s and when the Bruins could absolutely use exactly that. 
  
  It certainly doesn't help that the Bruins positioned themselves to do so much more with those picks, too. 

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  "I think Don did everything he needed to do leading up to that draft to get three first-round picks. I thought the moves that he made were really good and poised to set us up for the future," Neely admitted. "The guys put the list together. I think maybe during that time, we should have taken some time out. As everybody knows, we tried to move up in the draft. It didn’t work. We probably should have taken the time out and really just digested that list a little bit more."
  
  The Bruins sent Milan Lucic to the Kings in exchange for the No. 13 overall pick (Zboril), Martin Jones (later flipped to San Jose for Sean Kuraly and a future first-round pick used to select Trent Frederic), and defenseman Colin Miller (lost to Vegas in the 2017 expansion draft). They also sent Dougie Hamilton to the Calgary Flames for the No. 15 overall pick (Senyshyn) and a pair of '15 second-round picks the Bruins used to select Jeremy Lauzon and Jakob Forsbacka Karlsson. 
  
  You could argue that the Bruins got out from Lucic at the perfect time, but having just Zboril, Kuraly, and Frederic to show for it certainly stings. And same for trading Hamilton, a top-pairing defenseman then and now, for Senyshyn, Lauzon, and Forsbacka Karlsson (who has since bounced out of the North American game to return to his native Sweden). 
  
  As for the trade-up Neely mentioned, it's believed that the Bruins were targeting Massachusetts native Noah Hanifin, who went to the Hurricanes with the No. 5 overall pick. Hanifin was part of what many considered to the 'big three' on the blue line that draft year along with Ivan Provorov and Zach Werenski.  
  
  It was just about the worst start to Sweeney's first test in the big chair.  Complete with some bad intel from one of the B's scouts, as noted by Neely. 

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  "Then there was a pick that one of our scouts really thought wouldn’t be available in the second round," Neely said.
  
  That comment is most likely a reference to Senyshyn, who put up 26 goals and 45 points in 66 games in his draft year, but was regarded as a reach by many of the draft pundits on the air when the Bruins made that selection at No. 15. 
  
  The bad luck extended beyond the first round, really.
  
  In fact, the Bruins possessed six of the 2015 draft's first 52 picks. They turned that into Zboril, DeBrusk, Senyshyn, Brandon Carlo, Forsbacka Karlsson, and Lauzon. In one of the most talent-laden drafts of this era, the Bruins got just three bonafide full-time NHLers out of their first six picks. One of them is a top-four defenseman, but the other is looking like a third-line wing (and has trended downward in back-to-back seasons), while Lauzon's ceiling is looking closer to No. 5 or No. 6 defenseman compared to No. 2 or 3 defenseman. There's no shortage of players the Bruins 'could use' around those picks, too, from 6-foot-3 defenseman Erik Cernak to 6-foot-6 winger Jordan Greenway.
  
  There's also notable players in rounds three and four, including bottom-six dynamo Anthony Cirelli and Coyotes winger Conor Garland. (Boston used their third- and fourth-round picks on Daniel Vladar and Jesse Gabrielle, respectively.)
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  The Bruins weren't the only team to miss out on these players, of course. But it stings doubly so when you only hit on half of your first six picks, and have what's quickly looking like two first-round strikeouts on your books. 
  
  Oh, and the seemingly inconsequential fifth-round pick the Bruins traded to the Wild? That turned into Kirill Kaprizov, who scored 27 goals and 51 points in 55 games this season. As for the future fifth-round pick the Bruins acquired in exchange for the pick that turned into Kaprizov? That was used to select Cameron Clarke, who was ultimately not signed by the Bruins, and just wrapped up a 2020-21 ECHL season that included 23 points in 71 games for the Wichita Thunder. 
  
  Again, anything that could've gone wrong seemed to do exactly that in Sweeney's first draft on the job.
  
  "Obviously, hindsight is everything we’d all love to have. moving forward and thinking about making different decisions or better decisions," Neely said. "You can always do that in every draft though, no matter where you pick and how many picks you have."
  
  But with the Bruins rapidly approaching that long-discussed organizational crossroads — and with the franchise debating one last run with this aging core or going for a retool of sorts — there's no denying that things would be drastically different for the Black and Gold had it not been for that outright disaster of a draft that the franchise has finally acknowledged as such. 

Ty Anderson is a writer and columnist for 985TheSportsHub.com. Any opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of 98.5 The Sports Hub, Beasley Media Group, or any subsidiaries. Yell at him on Twitter: @_TyAnderson.