Bruins make another roster move ahead of two-game road trip
The Bruins are not just scratching forward Matt Poitras from Tuesday’s head-to-head with St. Louis.
They’re taking it a step further, in fact, with Poitras officially assigned down to AHL Providence by the team following Monday’s practice at Warrior Ice Arena.
In action for 14 games this season, the 20-year-old Poitras has recorded one goal and three assists, but had gone four straight games without a point prior to his demotion. And in addition to the point production drying up of late, three of his five least-deployed games had come in the last week, including just 11:08 of time on ice in last Saturday’s overtime loss to Ottawa, indicating that the Bruins were not giving Poitras the same rope they were out of the gate this season.
Speaking after practice, Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery said that taking Poitras out of the lineup (based on how practice went) was something done to give other players an opportunity, but also talked about where Poitras needed to improve to get back into the mix for the Black and Gold.
“More of an impact in the game,” Montgomery said when asked if there was something he wanted to see from Poitras. “Making more plays, understanding our structure.”
Even with his struggles, it’s worth mentioning that Poitras had still outproduced lineup fixtures such as Charlie Coyle and Trent Frederic to date, with four points compared to their three. Poitras had also outperformed Morgan Geekie (two points) prior to his assignment, with Geekie slated to return to the lineup Tuesday and in a top-line role after sitting as a healthy scratch for the last three games.
Given the rather bare bones nature of the B’s flight out to St. Louis — the Bruins did not make a recall for an extra defenseman and Poitras was the only spare forward on Boston’s roster — it’s entirely possible that this is a mere paper transaction to bank away some additional slivers of cap space. Or the Bruins could be looking at Poitras as someone who needs top-six minutes (and in all situations) down in Providence to get his game back to a place where he make a legitimate impact for the B’s NHL roster.
