Boston Bruins Moving On To Life Without Bergeron, Krejci

The season-opening win and the quick return for Bergeron, Krejci highlighted that the B's group is successfully turning the page

BOSTON – For the current Boston Bruins, training camp was about getting ready for the season while also adjusting to a couple of big-time presences that were going to be missing from the Black and Gold this year.

This week’s opening night win over the Chicago Blackhawks was about getting off on the right foot, and also in some ways turning the page from Bergeron and Krejci being such big influences as the top two centers within the group.

“Obviously I think there’s a lot of talk about who is not here and who isn’t here anymore,” admitted Milan Lucic a few days prior to the start of the regular season. “And for obvious reasons because your 1A and 1B center had been here for as long as they had, and they were one of the best 1-2 punches of their generation.

“So of course, they are going to be talked about. But for us I think we need to worry about the guys that are here and the opportunities there for different people to step up into different roles. One of the things that was always established here was that roles and positions are always earned. It’s not given out. You see that with [Johnny] Beecher and [Matt] Poitras. They earned their way into the lineup to be here right now. I think we just need to be a team, play a structured game and work as a group of five in all zones and all areas. The best success is team success, so we need to do our best to push that forward.”