Marco Sturm’s to-do listing with Bruins should begin with these 4 duties

Bruins

Player development, unlocking more offense, and preaching defensive values will be key for Sturm.

Marco Sturm said all of the right things on Tuesday during his introductory press conference as Bruins head coach.

“To be honest, I can’t wait to just go in the locker room and just work with my guys,” Sturm said in his first address as Boston’s bench boss. “That’s what I love to do. That’s what I want to do. And I can’t wait for Day 1 to see the Bruins fans behind me or behind us and pushing us to the next level.”

The 46-year-old coach’s appointment as the 30th head coach in franchise history is not without merit.

Despite his ties to the Bruins as a former player with a penchant for scoring big-time goals, Sturm elevated his stock as a head-coach in waiting both overseas and on the West Coast — building a reputation as a defensive-minded presence on the bench with a knack for communication and cultivating development in younger players.

Given the glaring deficiencies across Boston’s roster, Sturm will need to draw on all of his coaching strengths to elevate a Bruins squad that posted the fifth-worst record in the league this past season. 

There are several key objectives that Sturm must achieve in Boston — regardless of the depth chart in place once regular-season play begins in October. 

Here are four priorities for Sturm entering the 2025-26 campaign. 

Shore up Boston’s defensive structure

Months before the Bruins appointed Sturm as their new head coach, Don Sweeney pointed to Sturm’s former employer, the Los Angeles Kings, as a template for the type of stingy, structured defensive identity that routinely keeps clubs in the playoff mix. 

“If you don’t defend in the National Hockey League, you don’t have sustained success,” Sweeney said on April 23. “However you want to do, whether that’s zone, man to man, whether it’s a hybrid, whether that’s neutral zone, whether that’s…look at L.A.’s situation this year, going from 1-3-1 to a little bit more of a pressure situation that they’re doing, but they still do a really good job.

“They led the league in goals against. That’s part of winning hockey, it just has to be, and it’s going to be part of our fabric.”

Given Sturm’s seven-year run in the Kings’ organization — coupled with Boston’s reported interest in other defensive-minded assistants in their coaching search like Jay Leach and Mitch Love — it’s clear that the Bruins believe their first order of business is regaining its defensive identity. 

A bounce-back season for Jeremy Swayman holds the most weight over Boston’s chances of pushing for a playoff spot in 2026. But even with Swayman regaining his form and both Charlie McAvoy and Hampus Lindholm returning with a clean bill of health, Boston’s defensive structure is in need of a refresh. 

Even when the likes of McAvoy were patrolling the blue line, the Bruins were prone too far too many defensive breakdowns and puck-watching sequences in 2024-25. 

Yes, Swayman (-9.1 goals saved above expected, per MoneyPuck) left a lot to be desired between the posts. But, the Bruins also struggled when it came to clearing pucks out of Grade-A ice, ranking 20th in the NHL with 11.4 high-danger scoring chances allowed per 60 minutes of play (per Natural Stat Trick).

Be it augmenting the trusty zone defense that had been a staple in Boston since the days of Claude Julien or clogging up the neutral zone, Sturm needs to stabilize the Bruins’ defense if this team has any hope of righting the ship in 2025-26. 

Signing a scorer like Mitch Marner or Nikolaj Ehlers this offseason would certainly help the Bruins. But it won’t matter all that much if the Bruins are still taking on water in their own zone. 

Unlock more offense

The Bruins have the cap space — and potentially the draft capital on hand — to add scoring punch this summer via free agency or trade.

But, Boston can’t reasonably expect to fix a dreadful offensive personnel in 2025-26 by simply funneling money into the free-agent market, a lesson they learned firsthand this past summer. 

Considering how often Sweeney has mentioned the need for Boston to “evolve offensively” this spring, it’s clear that Sturm is going to be tasked with unearthing more scoring punch out of the personnel already in place.

Beyond David Pastrnak’s brilliance (43 goals, 106 points) and a breakout season from Morgan Geekie (33 goals), the rest of Boston’s O-zone approach left a lot to be desired this past year.

If the Bruins follow the Kings’ blueprint in 2025-26, that stingy neutral-zone trapping approach may not unlock much in terms of offensive creativity or risk-taking for a Bruins roster that had to work very hard just to create scoring chances — let alone put the puck in the back of the net — last season.

But, Sturm could stress principles that could boost Boston’s odds of generating quality looks.

Preaching a shot-first mindset from Boston’s D corps could lead to an uptick in the tips, rebounds, and other greasy goals that often become a primary source of offense once Grade-A ice dries up in the playoffs. 

After preaching a “quality over quantity” approach with their shot selection under Jim Montgomery, a Bruins roster short on scoring depth might be better served going for the shot-heavy approach stressed by Bruce Cassidy (and teams like the Carolina Hurricanes) in hopes of increasing the odds of those same rebounds, tips, and other high-danger looks. 

It’s a task easier preached than practicted, but rolling out a shot-first, forecheck-heavy approach on offense should help a Bruins team lacking in established talent boost its scoring capabilities beyond any offseason additions.  

“I mean, there’s different ways to approach things,” Sturm said of changing Boston’s offensive approach. “I think when I talk about, we want to score more goals, scoring more goals is not just in the offensive zone. Yes, that’s where the puck’s going to end up. But for me, it all starts, how are we going to get there? 

“So, that’s a big part too. Not just focusing on one area. I think there’s different areas in the game where we can definitely get better. It’s coming out with the puck. We want to have the puck more. We gotta have better entries, for example, not turn pucks over. I think that part was a big issue.”

Find a new assistant to spark Boston’s power play

Getting Boston’s power play back on track is also a necessity if Sturm plans on fixing the Bruins’ anemic offense. 

Once a foundational pillar of Boston’s offensive attack, the Bruins were firing blanks on the man advantage for most of the 2024-25 campaign, ranking 29th in the NHL with a 15.2 percent success rate. 

With opposing PK units focusing their efforts on taking away Pastrnak’s howitzer from the left circle, Boston’s power play had few contingency plans in place to generate quality scoring chances without their best player uncorking a shot. 

Beyond potential tweaks cooked up by Sturm (slotting a left-shot D on the top unit over McAvoy, deploying Pastrnak as more of a “rover”, etc.), the Bruins need another authority on their bench to try to untangle a misfiring power play. 

Boston is retaining assistants Chris Kelly, Leach, and goalie coach Bob Essensa moving forward. That leaves one coaching vacancy on Sturm’s staff, with the new Bruins head coach noting that he wants to add an assistant with “who has some power-play experience.”

If the Bruins are shifting Kelly — who helped run Boston’s power play this past year — over into Joe Sacco’s former role as the top authority on the penalty kill, the Bruins would be wise to target an assistant who can overhaul the Bruins’ power play. 

Preach patience for a younger roster

The 2025-26 Bruins roster is far from set in stone. But, the writing is on the wall that Boston will be fielding a younger squad this fall and giving prospects like Fraser Minten and Matt Poitras more rope to carve out significant roles moving forward. 

That might require more patience for a Bruins organization that has largely operated in a “win-now” mindset for close to two decades now. 

But Sturm — who helped prospects like Quinton Byfield and Brandt Clarke develop into lineup regulars in Los Angeles — believes that he’s attuned to getting more out of younger players trying to find their footing at hockey’s highest level.

“We’re all going to make mistakes. Old, young, it doesn’t matter,” Sturm said. “As long as you’re going to support him, but also you’ve got to be… again, you’ve got to be very honest and direct with him. You’ve got to work with him. And they also have to learn from it.

“I feel like they’re going to learn from our core group, from the older guys. And that’s why the whole thing, it’s so important. It’s not just me, it’s the team, right? And they gotta see it every day in practice. For example, they gotta see how guys practice every day so the young guys can follow. There shouldn’t be any excuses.”

The Bruins would be wise to focus on developing younger players in hopes of adding ancillary pieces to a core headlined by veterans like Pastrnak and McAvoy.

That might require some patience on the part of those same veterans when it comes to dealing with these short-term growing pains in 2025-26 in hopes of greater returns in the following years.

Sturm will need to sell Boston’s leaders on his vision well before training begins in order to get the buy-in needed for his first year at the helm. 

“I’m very clear,” Sturm said of his communication style. “I would say the meetings I have, the messages I’m going to deliver – could be system-wise, could be anything – I think it’s very, very clear. There will be no gray area.

“We’re all going to work together, and one thing is, I want to push those guys forward. I hate losing, and I’m very competitive on and off the ice, and that’s something a lot of people don’t know about Marco Sturm.”