Boston Bruins' Brad Marchand (63) skates against the Carolina Hurricanes during the first period of an NHL hockey game in Raleigh, N.C., Thursday, April 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Karl B DeBlaker)AP
Brad Marchand is thriving with the Florida Panthers.
Traded from Boston at the deadline for a first-round pick, the 37-year-old winger gearing up for his fourth Stanley Cup appearance, and hoping for his second victory.
As Florida worked their way through the Eastern Conference, Marchand scored four goals and added 10 assists in 17 postseason games. When the Panthers win and plastic rats are thrown onto the ice, players shoot them at Marchand in amusing fashion. He’s quickly become a locker room staple.
Marchand will return to the Stanley Cup Final on Wednesday night in Edmonton.
Speaking to ESPN’s Greg Wyshynski, the former Bruins captain shared some regrets from the end of his time in Boston. Marchand was saddened not to get to say goodbye to the fans from the ice — he was injured at the time of the trade — and regretted not living in the moment more at TD Garden.
“When you come to the rink, it can be stressful. You start overthinking things. There’s this pressure you sometimes put on yourself. You start stressing about things that you don’t need to stress about,” Marchand told ESPN. “I know that there are moments that I missed out on or didn’t really appreciate because I was stressing about other things.”
Marchand also said he regretted not relishing daily success more as the Bruins put together the NHL’s best regular season of all-time in 2022-23.
“We thought we were going to go to the finals that year. We thought we were going to win it all, and then we got pushed out in the first round,” Marchand said. “You start looking back at those moments and you realize you took all we did that season for granted because we were so worried about going to the finals. We weren’t living in the moment.”
It was the Panthers that ended that dream, eliminating the Bruins in the first round. Since then, Florida has gone to three straight Stanley Cups. They lost to the Golden Knights in 2022-23, beat Edmonton last season, and their rematch of the Oilers that kicks off this week — this time with Marchand in tow.
