Boston Bruins

Trent Frederic Exacts Revenge For His Captain

Published

10 months ago

November 30, 2023

No Milan Lucic for the Boston Bruins? No problem. That’s because the Bruins seemingly have a much younger power forward in the making in 25-year-old, 6-foot-3, 220-pound Trent Frederic.

During their recent three-game skid, the Boston Bruins have been called out by their head coach Jim Montgomery, the media, and their fans for not being physical enough.

“A lot of it gets back to checking. I think we’ve just been an easy team to play against. Not just the last three games, but probably the last six, seven,” Montgomery said on Wednesday.

They’ve also been criticized for not defending each other and having more of a pack mentality. That was on full display in their 7-4 loss to the New York Rangers last Saturday when Frederic himself was hit with a two-hander to the head from Rangers defenseman Jacob Trouba. The dirty play by Trouba went unpenalized by the referees and, sadly, by Frederic’s teammates.

Well, during the second period of the Bruins’ game against the San Jose Sharks on Thursday night, Trent Frederic did for his captain, Brad Marchand, what his teammates didn’t do to Trouba for him. With the Bruins up 2-0 on the Sharks 13:57 into the second period, Sharks 6-foot-2, 214-pound forward Givani Smith took a run at the 5-foot-9, 186-pound Marchand in the corner and hit him right on the numbers.

Givani Smith hits Brad Marchand from behind and the Bruins immediately come to Marchand’s defense: pic.twitter.com/3NsHLU9q6N

— Evan Marinofsky (@EvanMarinofsky) December 1, 2023

Not so surprisingly, given how inconsistent officiating has been this season, all Smith got was a two-minute minor for boarding. Boston Bruins defenseman Derek Forbort tackled Smith to the ice and got called for a two-minute minor for roughing, but the Bruins, and more specifically, Frederic, weren’t done with Smith. With :54 seconds left in the middle frame, Frederic hunted Smith down and challenged him. After falling to the ice early in the bout, Frederic recovered nicely and held his own.