BRIGHTON, Mass. – At this point, Ondrej Kase is not expected to join the Bruins until they arrive in Toronto later this week, and won’t be on the ice until sometime next week at the earliest. .
Cam Neely confirmed this when he spoke to the media via Zoom on Wednesday and it remains to be seen if David Pastrnak will return before practicing with Black and Gold. At least for Pastrnak, 24, she will be reuniting with her linemates Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand on the Perfection line and returning to a power play unit where she has worked closely with the other members for the past few years.
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But Kase is a player who had barely wet his feet with the Bruins after reaching the trade deadline, and who then stayed a bit out while recovering from a concussion following the Anaheim trade. The 24-year-old winger played exactly six games for the Bruins before the regular season stopped and only got one assist in 14:32 ice time per game while skating primarily with David Krejci.
He showed some knack for creating his own offense and it could be the kind of secondary offense the Bruins have been looking for the past few seasons. But now he’s far, far behind the rest of his teammates after missing camp while tagged “unfit to participate,” and now the Bs are losing their alleged far 6s to the far right at the moment.
That is clearly a challenge for Kase, and for the Bruins.
“Clearly, Ondrej has not joined us and we are traveling to Toronto on Sunday, so we have two practices left. [in Boston]. So you have to catch up, “Bruins head coach Bruce Cassidy said during Thursday’s call to the Bruins media.” If we feel like he’s not trapped and we feel like [Anders] Bjork and [Karson Kuhlman] They are playing well, so that is the direction we will go. I haven’t seen Ondrej play in the playoffs, so he would be a man we are not 100 percent sure of how he will perform at that level.
“You assume it would be fine… better than fine, it would be good. But now you’re chasing him a little bit when you get that far. So we have to look at that. And we have said it all along. There could be people due to the testing purposes lagging behind, and you should trust its depth. We are experiencing that right now even though we haven’t played any games. “
On the other side of Kase, Anders Bjork has been one of the best on the training field and has played mainly with Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand in Pastrnak’s place.
Don’t doubt that the Bruins won’t forget it anytime soon as they watch a player who is ready to play and looks ready to move on in his game, rather than a talented young man in Kase who has never before achieved a place. missing for Back to Game camp.
