There will be plenty of competition for Duran at center on the Bruins, including Elias Lindholm, Charlie Coyle, Pavel Zacha, Morgan Geekie, Johnny Beecher, and Matthew Poitras.
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Four development camps into his Black-and-Gold career immersion, along with his 15-game AHL Providence primer this past spring,
Riley Duran will report to Brighton a month from now for the kickoff of his Bruins career.
Duran, 22, will be among the two dozen or so rookies who’ll open camp Sept. 11 at Warrior Arena, then report directly to the Prospects Challenge (Sept. 13-16), the six-team tourney in Buffalo. It all will begin there for the 6-foot-2-inch, 200-pound center, a Woburn kid who grew up going to Bruins games on Causeway Street with his father, modeling his game after
Patrice Bergeron, and hoping one day he’d hold a roster spot with the hometown team.
“Crazy. It felt like a dream, how it all happened,” said Duran, thinking back to the fall day in 2020 when the Bruins made him the 182nd pick in the NHL Draft. “First seeing my name [get called], then getting those calls from [general manager
Don]
Sweeney and [team president
Cam]
Neely. Just a dream come true.”
Now, as Duran is well aware, comes the reality of hard work, and the unknown world of exactly what it will take to win an NHL job.
Few kids, especially those picked in the 100-and-whatevers, step directly out of the college game and lock down varsity NHL roster spots.
Duran turned pro in March, signing with the Bruins after three solid seasons for the Providence College Friars, and now will attempt to filch a job from a forward group considerably upgraded by Sweeney in the offseason.
For the moment, the 1-2 center spots look to be locked down by newcomer
Elias Lindholm and
Charlie Coyle. The rest of the middle looks like it will be filled by returnees
Pavel Zacha (if he’s not flipped back to wing),
Morgan Geekie,
Johnny Beecher, and perhaps
Matt Poitras.
Just a year ago, Poitras was a wide-eyed 19-year-old, still with junior eligibility, who thrived in the Prospects Challenge, then caught more eyes in varsity camp, and clinched a roster spot with his smart, comprehensive play in the preseason. So it can happen. Kids can move up quickly and dine at the adult table.
Duran, like the rest of the rooks, hopes to be the next one, though it’s clear he’ll arrive with expectations tempered.
“I don’t really like to think about it,” he said during a recent phone conversation, following his morning workout at Warrior before an afternoon of golf. “I just want to go into it with the attitude that I had at [Team USA] World Junior camp. Maybe people thought I was going to make it, but I really didn’t think that way — I just put my best foot forward and I ended up making the team. So I’m just trying to go with that same mentality — no high expectations, just go in and work my butt off.”
Duran secured a spot on the USA roster for the IIHF’s showcase WJC tourney during his freshman season at Providence and cobbled together a respectable 2-3–5 line in his five games. He played the prior season for USHL Youngstown, following a nomadic high school tour in which he played a freshman season at Woburn High, a sophomore year at Malden Catholic, and then his junior and senior seasons at Lawrence Academy.
In his brief stay this spring with AHL Providence, Duran played 15 games (including four in the postseason) and finished 2-2–4. It was a modest start, to be expected, considering the switch from NCAA hockey (face cage mandatory) to the pro game, with opponents typically older and stronger. Duran entered with an adult’s build, which helped, but every move up the ladder has its nuances.
“One of the reasons I signed [after three college seasons] is that Boston is such a structured organization,” he said. “When you play at Providence College, it’s all structure. So that’s one thing I really enjoyed [in the transition]. But it was a little different pace, because when I arrived [with the Providence Bruins], those guys were 70 games deep [into the season], and I’d only played 35 games [the last year in college].”
as become increasingly rare the last 25-plus years for NHL prospects (other than those from Minnesota) to have played traditional high school hockey. Duran started at Woburn High, he said, because he wanted to play at least one year for his father,
Jim, the school’s longtime hockey coach and athletic director. He then switched to Malden Catholic, eager to be coached by
John McLean (now a member of the Bruins development staff). Once McLean left MC, Duran opted for the prep school route in Groton.
The start of that four-year tour had Duran playing on the blue line.
“Like my dad always says, everyone can play one position,” said Ryan, “but not many can play all three positions.”
Did the now Bruins center wannabe enjoy his one season on D?
“Uhh, I wasn’t a big fan of it,” he said. “I think practices were the worst part because you’re taking two-on-ones all day. But it’s a different view of the game, and that was really good for me.”
In a month, Duran begins to find where the next road leads. He can only hope it’s the kind of fit and journey he enjoyed in Woburn, where he grew up on the street with his name, Duran Drive.
“Yeah, my grandfather owned a paving company. It still exists, J.F. Duran and Sons,” he explained. “It’s the part of town where he had his yard [to store equipment]. Once the family started coming, my grandfather gave [the land] to the kids, and now it’s called Duran Drive.”
