Bruins’ Morgan Geekie Relishes Opportunity To Center David Pastrnak

With Pavel Zacha day-to-day with an upper-body injury, the Boston Bruins will look to Morgan Geekie to center the top line with David Pastrnak and Jake DeBrusk flanked on his wings.

“It’s awesome. Anytime you get to play with players of their caliber it’s something special,” Geekie told reporters following Bruins practice on Tuesday, per the team. “I’m just trying to go out there and kinda give them the puck in the right spots. We all know what (Pastrnak) can do with it. Just try to get open, make space for him and create some plays.”

Even though Geekie has not played on the same line as Pastrnak this season, he believes he is familiar enough with how Pastrnak plays simply by watching him and confident that they will generate offense.

“You see it in his game, the things he likes to do. His trends, his tendencies,” Geekie said. “Just things you pick up playing, even when I’m on the bench. He’s fun to watch. I watch him just as much as you guys. I’ve picked up on some things he likes to do and the way he likes to play. I’ll just try to feed into that and keep going.”

Geekie added: “We have the best tickets in the house to watch a game, to be honest with you. You’re paying attention on the bench. You’re trying to pay attention for a lot of things. Lots of times, you’re paying more attention to what they’re doing and things that work and don’t. I also like to pay attention to guys … how they like to play, where they like to be and just trends in their game.”

Bruins head coach Jim Montgomery knows the absence of the injured Zacha and defenseman Charlie McAvoy doesn’t mean only Geekie will be responsible for filling their roles, it will be a group effort.

“By everyone contributing, everyone digging in,” Montgomery said, per the team. “You don’t replace one of your top two centers and you don’t replace your top D-man with an individual. It’s got to be an effort by everybody eating more minutes, and they got to do the job.”

Geekie has seven points in 20 games for Boston this season while averaging 14:13 minutes of ice time. Playing with Pastrnak will certainly increase his ice time in the Bruins’ matchup with the New Jersey Devils on Wednesday night.