Finding a Way to Elevate: David Krejci

Every year there are players who breakout in the playoffs and then follow that up with strong regular seasons. This season we watched players like Andrew Ladd, Dustin Byfuglien, Joe Pavelski, Ville Leino amongst others elevate their game. This daily snippet will point out that player in an attempt to find some sleepers for next year prior to the end of the playoffs.

David Krejci was pretty bad during the first round. In fact, his lines’ lack of elevation drove them into seven games against a team, the Montreal Canadiens, they were heavily favored against. During the series, the Czech pivot only managed one goal over seven games, ONE GOAL. His entire line for that matter only produced six points over all seven games, although two goals came off the stick of whipping boy Nathan Horton during overtime, clearly helping his Boston Bruins save face.

But that is the best part of the playoffs, a clean slate for every series and the chance to be a hero every night.

That is just what Krejci did the last two nights actually. His line last night was pretty impressive around the board as he registered some good counting stats with the game winning goal in overtime, three shots on net, a two-minute minor and finished with a plus-one rating. He did all that after following a dominant performance in game one — 2 G, 2 A, 4 SOG, +3, 2 PIM. Both nights he received first star of the game, deservedly so.

Last season the Bruins relied on Marc Savard to lead their team from down the middle, followed by Patrice Bergeron. They did not have Krejci, or stalwart Dennis Seidenberg, for their seven-game series during these same Eastern Conference Semi-Finals. This season, Krejci is showing just what he can do in crunch time and clearly is making up for lost time.

If the Bruins pull off this series they will very much be doing it with the help of their young first-line center.

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