Bruins F Senyshyn Wants To Stick With Big Club This Season

Zach Senyshyn is currently touring New England’s smaller cities with the Boston Bruins Summer Fan Fest, but the aspiring Bruins prospect is hoping after making his NHL debut last season and appearing in two NHL games for the B’s, he’ll be staying in New England’s biggest city, Boston and playing full time in the NHL this upcoming season.

“It definitely lit a fire under me,” Senyshyn told Boston Hockey Now this past Sunday during the Fan Fest stop in Burlington, Vermont. “When you get a taste of it and how close it really is, you get really excited for the upcoming season. For my summer training, it’s made me a lot more passionate and really excited for the upcoming year.”

Selected 15th in the 2015 NHL Draft by the Bruins, Senyshyn isn’t the only one envisioning a potentially longer stint with the big club. One of the big takeaways from general manager Don Sweeney’s free agency presser back on July 1 was how the Boston Bruins were going to have more internal competition for positions in training camp which opens September 13 at Warrior Arena. With depth being such a strength of the Bruins, more players will get an opportunity to fill voids left by forwards Marcus Johansson and Noel Acciari who signed elsewhere in unrestricted free agency. One of those players is Senyshyn, whom Sweeney spoke highly of back in July.

“I think Danton Heinen, depends on which side we play him on. If you think whether Karson [Kuhlman] or [Zach] Senyshyn, whoever, Brett Ritchie, obviously guys who are right shot if we play lefty/righty and move Danton over, I think fits into that same milk of player, creative wise,” Sweeney said after losing Acciari and at the time expecting to lose Johansson. “Marcus wasn’t a shoot-first guy either, and Danton’s not. We’d like him to shoot a little more volume, if he can. We’ll see when Anders Bjork comes back online. We’ll see what Peter Cehlarik does. I think we have, as I referenced, some guys internally. Paul Carey’s another guy that’s played a lot of games in the National Hockey League with his skillset. You never know where guys are going to come back at and assimilate with.

You know, Paul being able to play with Charlie Coyle, let’s see. Let’s see where it goes. I’m not rubber-stamping any of that, but I do believe we have enough depth that was an area that showed up in this year’s team that was very valuable. Hopefully, we recognize that we’ve addressed some of that when we couldn’t go fishing in the deepest of waters.”

Even though he only appeared in two games last season with Boston, his size and speed were on display as he notched his first career goal against the Minnesota Wild. Senyshyn knows he will have to play to his strengths once training camp starts in September.

“The thing I need to work on the next year bring that consistency and being ready on pucks and having that strong lower body. Using my size and speed to my advantage,” he said.

While Senyshyn is not the only player that had experience with the Bruins last season, he can use the time he did have to his advantage once training camps starts in September. Being a student of the game is just as if not more important than physical ability. Senyshyn plans to take what he learned from the veteran players and translate it to ice in the fall. He is full of confidence and ready to prove he can make it with the big club.

“Definitely just a lot of confidence. Again its something to be so close to guys like Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand they set the right example,” Senyshyn added. “At the end of the day, they put it in your hands to put in the work. And again if you put in the work and bring that confidence to the table I like my chances.”

Senyshyn will have stiff competition to earn a regular spot with the Bruins come training with new additions Par Lindholm and Brett Ritchie in the mix. But if he comes in with that confidence he talked about and shows off his size and speed, Senyshyn increases his chances of making the Bruins.