\u201cThe combine has been a staple for us since I\u2019ve been doing it,\u201d Nadeau said. \u201cFinally just really tighten up our draft board, which is already in a good spot. There may be a tiny bit of shuffling here and there. June is a lot of time spent on the phone following up with coaches, trainers, management of junior teams, colleges. Just trying to get any last background information that we need.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nadeau and his team don\u2019t just go in depth on the players who could be in the Bruins\u2019 range; they create folders on everyone in the first round and pockets throughout the draft. Especially this year, Boston had the chance to make another top 10 selection. When the B\u2019s acquired Fraser Minten from the Toronto Maple Leafs in March 2025, the package included a 2025 fourth-round pick and a 2026 conditional first-round pick. That 2026 first-round pick was top-five protected, and the Maple Leafs ultimately won the draft lottery and are picking first overall.<\/p>\n
While the Bruins\u2019 focus shifts to the latter half of the first round now, the work does not go to waste because, as Nadeau has learned, anything can happen on draft day. When Nadeau boarded his flight to Las Vegas, Nevada, for the 2024 NHL Draft, Boston was not picking in the first round. Then, on June 24, Sweeney dealt Linus Ullmark to the Ottawa Senators for Mark Kastelic, Joonas Koprisalo and a 2024 first-round pick. That turned into Dean Letourneau, who was selected 25th overall by the Bruins.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the draft, you never know. You could always trade\u2026There was a little extra emphasis this year on sort of a top 10, much like last year. Our job is to make sure we know all the players, the entire spectrum and go from there,\u201d Nadeau said. \u201cAs it turned out, coming out of the lottery, I guess we had a little less concern in that area. But I still feel really good about where the draft board is at the spot in case there\u2019s any movement or different things happening.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nadeau and the Bruins\u2019 amateur scouts are all over the country and world throughout the NHL season getting eyes on the next draft class. There are more tools at their disposal now, too, that help the group feel confident in their decisions.<\/p>\n
Jeremy Rogalski, the Director of Hockey Analytics, leads the data efforts for the B\u2019s. Rogalski joined the organization in 2009 as an assistant to hockey administration, transitioned to video analyst in 2010, was named hockey operations assistant in 2015 and earned his current position in 2017. He leans on his experience in all corners of the Bruins\u2019 hockey operations department to present the scouts with useful, supplemental information to their eye tests.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur involvement has grown over time. It is kind of like a process partnership now from start to finish\u2026When it comes to evaluating the players, obviously we have the views, we\u2019ve got video and we\u2019ve got data tools, too. Ten years ago we might look at a guy and say, \u2018Hey, he had 60 points in his draft year, that\u2019s pretty good. That normally goes in the second round.\u2019 Now we have data behind that that says, \u2018Okay, this is how that player plays,\u2019\u201d Rogalski said. \u201cSo we can start to break down those micro-conversations, the fit \u2013 and that\u2019s where it really gets interesting to the scouts. Like, \u2018I saw the guy move the puck really well in my views.\u2019 Well, we\u2019ve got 50 other games that say he tends not to move the puck very well, so let\u2019s work through that. How did you see him move the puck well? Was he just using his partner?\u2019 It gets pretty in-depth when you start working through all those elements.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThe combine has been a staple for us since I\u2019ve been doing it,\u201d Nadeau said. \u201cFinally just really…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":720480,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-720479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=720479"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720479\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/720480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=720479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=720479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=720479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}