Albeit a so-so 15-15-3 for the season, Swayman has been mostly brilliant and brilliant-plus for the better part of the last six weeks.
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To spare everyone a deep drill into hockey analytics (not to worry, plenty of math here later), we’ll revive Ch. 38′s “Three Keys to the Game,” Fred and Derek style, ahead of the Bruins’ matinee Saturday in Ottawa.
The three keys for the Bruins will be, in order of significance: 1. Swayman; 2. Swayman; 3. Swayman.
If the pattern is not self-evident, the afternoon’s hopes, perhaps along with all playoff aspirations across 36 games left in the regular season, rest with the 26-year-old Jeremy Swayman. The ex-Maine Black Bear is now on top of his game in the midst of the Bruins as a whole intent on flirting with the bottom of the barrel.
Albeit a so-so 15-15-3 for the season, Swayman has been mostly brilliant and brilliant-plus for the better part of the last six weeks, in the wake of the
8-1 Manitoba mauling he and his Black and Gold brethren suffered on the snowy night of Dec. 10 in Winnipeg.
In his dozen games since, Swayman has stopped 307 of 334 shots, a sparkling .919 save percentage, and has been the one constant, the good thing keeping alive the franchise’s hopes of, as team captain Brad Marchand called it on Friday, “getting in the dance.”
Swayman was in net for the last two games, back-to-back wins, when the
Panthers and Lightning combined for a hefty 88 shots on his net and a lopsided, mind-numbing 191-84 advantage in shot attempts. He let in five of those shots (.943 save percentage), and like the three keys noted above, would have been deserving of all three stars in both games.
The trend for Swayman has been Vezina-worthy, though the lead horses in that race are too far down the track with more wins for him to catch. As for the team he backs, as interim coach Joe Sacco stressed after Friday’s workout in Brighton, being so goalie-dependent is not how the Bruins care to go about their business.
“We don’t want to be doing that to our goaltenders,” noted Sacco, his squad ranked 10th in the Eastern Conference Friday morning with a .533 points percentage. “I think it’s [Swayman] getting back to being the goaltender he’s capable of being. But we don’t want it to be, ‘Hey, let’s give up 40 shots and have our goaltender save 37 or 38 of them,’ right? We want to be better in front of our goaltenders.”
If he were to keep up the pace, Swayman would finish with 59 appearances, the most by a Bruins goalie since Tuukka Rask’s 65 in 2016-17.
Swayman’s desire to carry such a hefty load was, in part, why the Bruins in the offseason wheeled Linus Ullmark to the Senators (Ullmark remains hindered by a back injury and will not be in net for the matinee).
To that point, particularly now with each start so significant, Swayman got what he bargained for (with the matching eight-year/$66 million contract finalized on the eve of the season). The workload, in fact, is more than either side calculated, and of late Swayman has more than held up his end of the bargain.
“I’m grateful to get my name called,” Swayman mused following the late-morning workout at Warrior Arena. “But at the same time, I’ve got to earn it, every single day, because we’ve got a competitive lineup to crack and that’s our job as a goaltending tandem [with partner Joonas Korpisalo].”
What Swayman learned along the way this season was a lesson or reminder not to change his training routine. He likes to think of his preparation, on and off the ice, as what leads him to treat each game and practice “like another day at the office.”
“I think I was playing with that at the beginning of the year, and I wasn’t getting the results,” he said. “I wasn’t getting the results that I wanted, didn’t feel as good as I wanted to, because my whole life I’ve worked for everything I’ve earned. That routine has worked for me and it’s given me a sense of pride in that work ethic and everyday effort. That’s a confidence-booster for me. I know if I am working my hardest and doing the extra work — and not taking short days or off days — I get better results out of myself and out of my body.”
Characterizing his off-day training “pretty sacred,” Swayman said he has grown diligent about incorporating pilates as part of his practice routine, helping him build hip and core strength.
“Every day I am trying to implement something to use these compensating muscles that don’t get used when I am on the ice as much,” he said. “That way I am trying to prevent injury, eliminate what could be a lingering injury related to, say, soft-tissue stuff.”
The puck drops Saturday at 3:08 p.m. in Ottawa, with Sway, Sway, and Sway upright and ready in the Bruins’ net.
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