Boston Bruins
Boston Got Fraser Minten in a Trade and a Hobey Baker Finalist in the Draft. Both Matter Now.
The Bruins are thin down the middle — thin enough that it’s nearly certain a former top-ten pick makes the jump this fall. That’s the opportunity side.
The other side is a 22-year-old who already played a full NHL season, earned minutes alongside David Pastrnak, and is being counted on as the team’s future second-line center.
Fraser Minten, C — second full season, 22 years old
How he got here. Toronto dealt Minten to Boston in the Brandon Carlo trade, and it has aged extremely well for the Bruins.
He played only 19 games for the Maple Leafs between 2023 and 2025, recording four points, then finished the 2024-25 campaign with six games and a single goal.
What changed. Last season he played a full 82 games and put up 35 points — and, more telling than the total, was trusted enough to skate alongside Pastrnak. He went pointless in the playoffs, which is the asterisk.
The projection. Minten is Boston’s 2C of the future and will get those minutes this season. Everything about his first full year suggests he won’t be a sophomore-slump case: the usage grew, the coaching staff’s trust grew, and the production followed rather than preceded them.
Watch whether the playoff blank was a sample-size artifact or a sign that his game shrinks under pressure. Eighty-two games will answer it.
James Hagens, C — first full season, 20 years old
The résumé. Taken seventh overall in 2025, Hagens was a Hobey Baker Award finalist last season with 23 goals and 24 assists across 34 games at Boston College. He was, at one point in his draft year, projected to go first overall before sliding to Boston.
The handling. The Bruins didn’t rush him. After his college season ended he played six AHL games and five NHL contests, and the organization was deliberately cautious with his ice time.
The problem for his Calder case. That caution may continue. It’s unlikely Hagens gets true top-six minutes to begin the season — or, some think, at all this year. He ranks tenth in preseason Calder projections largely because of deployment rather than ability.
The argument for him anyway. He’s an elite playmaker, and Boston is weak enough down the middle that the depth chart may not hold. Slotting between a finisher like Pastrnak or Morgan Geekie is the kind of opportunity that changes a rookie season in a month.
Projection. Middle-six to start, with a real path upward.
Why this pairing is the season
Boston’s two most important young forwards are a 22-year-old with a full NHL year behind him and a 20-year-old with five games. They play the same position. Both are being developed as long-term centers.
That’s either the healthiest kind of internal competition or a logjam, and which one it turns out to be depends almost entirely on how quickly Hagens forces the issue.
What a second-year leap actually looks like
The sophomore slump is real and common — the intensity of a professional season demands an adjustment that not every young player manages. But last season’s breakout sophomores (Lane Hutson, Cutter Gauthier, Logan Stankoven, Jackson Blake, Josh Doan) all built on strong rookie years and now rank among the league’s better young players.
There’s no fixed timeline. Macklin Celebrini’s leap came in year two. Juraj Slafkovsky needed four seasons to reach 30 goals. Utah’s Dylan Guenther never topped 27 goals in three years, then scored 40 in his fourth.
Minten’s case is the year-two version. Hagens’ is the year-one version. Boston needs at least one of them to work.
Around the rest of the league
Porter Martone, F — Philadelphia Flyers. The preseason Calder favorite, and the rookie Hagens is ranked nine spots behind. Martone produced 25 goals and 25 assists in 35 games at Michigan State, then 15 points in 19 NHL games including the playoffs, averaging just under 17 minutes. The difference between them is opportunity as much as talent.
Gavin McKenna, F — Toronto Maple Leafs. The first overall pick, ranked second, and potentially skating with John Tavares and William Nylander — the best situation of any rookie in the league.
Anton Frondell and Roman Kantserov, F — Chicago Blackhawks. Ranked fourth and fifth, the only teammates in the top five. Connor Bedard’s shoulder surgery keeps him out until November, which hands both an immediate runway — the opposite of Hagens’ situation in Boston.
The number that tells the story
Hagens’ ice time in November. If Boston is still limiting him after a month, the Calder ranking was right and this is a development year.
If the Bruins’ weakness at center forces him up the lineup next to Pastrnak, a Hobey Baker finalist with elite playmaking gets the one thing he’s missing — and the tenth-ranked rookie in the preseason polls stops being tenth.
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