Over the last two weeks, the Bruins have added to their organizational depth by signing a pair of undrafted free agent defensemen out of college.

Their first addition was Minnesota-Duluth defenseman Nick Wolff who signed a one-year entry level deal that will begin in the 2020-21 season.

The 6-foot-5-inch Wolff is a former college teammate with current Bruins forward Karson Kuhlman who also was signed as an undrafted free agent out of Duluth. 

Wolff and the Bruins have some familiarity between each other as Wolff attended Bruins development camp in both the summers of 2018 and 2019.

In four seasons with the Bulldogs, Wolff appeared in 156 games with 14 goals, 39 assists and 53 points. In each of the last three seasons, Wolff has helped lead his fellow Bulldogs to the Frozen Four title game, winning the National Championship in each of the last two seasons with victories over Notre Dame in 2018 and last season over UMASS.

A week after signing Wolff, the Bruins added to their defensive pipeline once again, signing undrafted free agent Jack Ahcan out of St. Cloud State.

Unlike Wolff who is a big body that likes to throw it around, Ahcan is more like a Torey Krug-type defenseman. At 5-foot-8, Ahcan packs more of an offensive punch on the blueline.

As captain of St. Cloud State, Ahcan finished up his collegiate career with 21 goals and 103 points in 144 career NCAA games.

Ahcan is another one who has some familiarity with some of his potential future teammates as Ahcan and Charlie McAvoy were teammates on the 2017 World Junior Championship team that won gold representing Team USA.

The Bruins have had some luck in past years with undrafted free agents as players like Kuhlman, Frank Vatrano, Krug, Noel Acciari and Kevan Miller have all had productive seasons with the Bruins.

Ahcan’s contract is a two-year entry-level deal.

On Friday the Bruins shipped David Backes, prospect Axel Andersson and their 2020 first-round draft pick to the Anaheim Ducks for 24-year old Ondrej Kase. The Bruins will retain 25% of Backes’ salary.

Injuries have been a key factor in Kase’s development in three plus seasons with the Ducks, but the Czech Republic native still has a respectable 96 points in 198 career NHL games.

Kase has not played since February 7th after taking a big hit from Maple Leafs defenseman Jake Muzzin, but the right winger returned to practice earlier this week and will join his new teammates in Boston on Monday.

“The obvious question that people are going to ask is Ondrej’s health, and he’s been back on the ice. He will join the team back here in Boston and not in Vancouver [Saturday] or Calgary,” general manager Don Sweeney said in a conference call Friday afternoon. 

“It’s a quick turnaround for him to go and do that, he was on the ice at practice yesterday. But he’ll have today [Friday] off, he’ll travel. We’ll get him in, he’ll be on ice with us fully on Monday. And then we’ll make an evaluation as to how comfortable he is in getting back to playing.”

No, he doesn’t bring the top-six punch that a Chris Kreider, Tyler Toffoli or Kyle Palmieri does, but Sweeney and company ultimately decided they were not going to pay the steep price for one of the bigger available fish. 

Instead, Sweeney gets Kase who brings much of what the Bruins were looking for. He’s a right shot winger, has speed to his game, is a young forward and most importantly, he’s under contract beyond the 2019-20 season.

Kase is locked in through 2021 with a respectable cap hit of $2.6 million. He will be a restricted free agent in the summer of 2021, keeping Kase under the Bruins control for years to come.

His seven goals in 49 games with the Ducks won’t jump out at you, but Kase is very effective five-on-five. According to Natural Stat Trick, among forwards with at least 500 minutes of five-on-five ice time, Kase ranks 31st in Corsi For Percentage at 54.66%. Kase’s Corsi For Percentage only trails Patrice Bergeron, Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak among Bruins forwards.

“His expected goals are generally at the top of his grouping. A lot of that is five-on-five. He has played some power play, secondary power-play units. But he does drive puck possession, positive impact at both ends of the ice in five-on-five situations,” Sweeney added. “He’s been a player that’s been in the top of his categories in five-on-five production over the last three years per 60 minutes.”

It’s expected that Kase will be given an opportunity to secure a top-six role, playing to the right of Jake DeBrusk and David Krejci. His shoot-first mentality should work well with Krejci who will be able to get him the puck and DeBrusk who likes to get himself to the net for tips and to clean up loose pucks.

Five-on-five Kase is averaging 10.38 shots per 60 minutes, that would only trail David Pastrnak (10.67) among Bruins forwards.

Thanks to his recovery from shoulder surgery and concussions issues, Kase was limited to just 30 games last season after setting career highs in goals, (20) assists (18) and points (38) the year prior.

“The last couple years he’s shown he can score in this league,” Krejci said. “He has great skills and good speed. He needs to learn the system quickly and get on the same page. Everything’s going to be new to him, not just whatever line he’s on.”

With Kase expected to slide into the second line, Karson Kuhlman should now see more minutes on the third line with Anders Bjork and Charlie Coyle. That’s where Kuhlman found himself in Friday’s wild 4-3 victory over the Calgary Flames.

The line was the Bruins’ best Friday night. In 10:51 of five-on-five ice time together, the trio had a Corsi For Percentage of 70%, a Scoring Chances For Percentage of 87.50%, landed six shots on goal and it was Bjork and Kuhlman who set Coyle up for his first period goal.

After Bjork blocked a Flames shot in the defensive zone, he found a loose puck and made the smart play, tapping a pass to Kuhlman as several Flames forwards approached him. Kuhlman sent a long-distance tape-to-tape pass to Coyle who finished the play with his third goal in four games.

“I really like Karson. I really like his game,” said Coyle. “I don’t know how tall he is, but he works on the boards. I was really impressed last year when I first came over. I didn’t really know that much about him. But just seeing how hard he works in the battles and coming out with the puck for a guy his size, I really like playing with him. It’s nice to click and get one the first game.”

With Kase in the fold, competition for playing time is going to become more intense. With one more game (Saturday night in Vancouver) before Kase arrives in Boston, Kuhlman will get another chance to show that he deserves to be in the lineup every night and deserves to ne next to Bjork and Coyle.

“I thought they were arguably our best line in terms of puck possession. How they were able to control the tempo of the game, stay out of trouble in their own end,” said head coach Bruce Cassidy. 

“I thought they did a good job, showed some good chemistry. I think that’s the type of game Kuhlie [Kuhlman] will excel in a little more, where there’s a puck-possession guy down low and he can just get to the open spots and create some turnovers on the forecheck.”

Despite no longer being on the Bruins roster, being able to move Backes and his cap hit will have a major effect on the Bruins roster. Instead of carrying $4.9 million of Backes’ dead weight, Backes will account for just $1.5 million in cap space. 

With Torey Krug, Zdeno Chara and Jaroslav Halak all unrestricted free agents after this season and Anders Bjork, Jake DeBrusk, Kuhlman and Matt Grzelcyk all in need of new contracts as restricted free agents, the Bruins need every bit of cap space they can get.

After the Toronto Maple Leafs sent Patrick Marleau’s unwanted contract along with a conditional first-round pick in 2020 and a 2020 seventh-round pick to the Carolina Hurricanes this past June, moving Backes and his $6 million cap hit became more difficult after the Leafs set the bar pretty high.

Hats off to Sweeney for unloading Backes and the attached first-round pick and getting much more value in return than the 2020 sixth-round pick Toronto got for Marleau.

On the surface, the trade reads Backes, Andersson and a 1st for Kase, but the cap relief the Bruins now have adds much more value to the trade.

According to Cap Friendly the Bruins currently have nearly $19 million in cap space for next season. 

As for what’s next for the Bruins, I don’t believe they’re done yet. I think another move or two for some added depth is in the works.

“We’ll continue to make calls and look at different opportunities that may exist,” Sweeny said. “As far as the next trade, that’s between the two teams that make it, honestly. Obviously, our past history and current precedent that sort of set the parameters, but it always comes down to the supply and demand of the two teams involved.”

Pastrnak is one of the game’s best dressed, often rocking one of his many stylish hats. If Pastrnak is in the market for some new hats, he had plenty to choose from Wednesday night at TD Garden.

However, I think the hats that littered the Garden ice after Pastrnak scored goals 39, 40 and 41 aren’t quite his style.

Scoring goals has been more of his style, though. Pastrnak’s three-goal evening Wednesday night was his fourth hat trick of the season and second against Montreal in those four.

Pastrnak becomes the first player to earn two hat tricks in a single season against the Canadiens since Gordie Howe did so in the 1951-52 season.

Goal 39 was the one that set a new career high for the 23-year old Pastrnak. Goals 40 and 41 were just as fun.

“Obviously it’s a huge honor, especially in an organization like the Bruins, you know, with a history like that,” Pastrnak said Wednesday night. “Obviously couldn’t have done it without my teammates. [40 goals is] something I hadn’t accomplished yet in my career, so obviously excited. But how I said, I couldn’t have done it without my teammates and big thanks to them.”

Now that Pastrnak has hit the 40-goal mark for the first time in his career, 50 seems to be the next big milestone in Pastrnak’s sight.

Getting to 50 shouldn’t be an issue.

“Now he’s at forty and who knows what’s next, right? There’s still a lot of hockey left. I think the way he started this year, we’d all thought he’d be in that area anyway, challenging for fifty,” said head coach Bruce Cassidy.

“That’ll be the next conversation I assume, and good for him. He deserves it. He’s done a lot of things well and he goes to the right spots, worked on his shot, worked on his strength to handle pucks. Let’s see him keep going.”

Pastrnak’s three-goal night helped him leap frog both Auston Matthews and Alex Ovechkin in the race to the Rocket Richard Trophy which is awarded annually to the player who finishes the season with the most goals in the league.

Since the award was created in the 1998-99 season, no Bruin has won the award. Pastrnak (41) holds a one goal edge over both Matthews and Ovechkin (40.) The Capitals sniper has won the award six out of the last seven seasons and eight times overall.

“He’s really become an elite player in the league. The fact that he’s able to continue and find ways to score when teams are really zoning in on him, it’s very impressive. There’s very few guys in the league that can do that,” Brad Marchand said of Pastrnak.

“Even his defensive game is continuing to come along. He cares about that aspect. He wants to win. He’s a great teammate. He’s going to be a hell of a player for a long time.”

At 23-years old, the sky is the limit for Pastrnak and the future is so very bright. As Ovechkin sits two goals away from becoming just the eighth player in league history to reach the 700-goal mark, who could possibly be next?

“Well, I’m going to say Pasta (173 goals) because I love the kid, and he’s young, and he’s scoring. So, I think it’s always about health, it’s always are you surrounded by good players to help you,” Cassidy added.

“I haven’t looked close enough to [Steven] Stamkos’ [419 goals) age to see what – because you always have to project, but in terms of the younger guys, [Patrick] Laine (134 goals) could be that guy because he has such a terrific shot. Is [Nikita] Kucherov (215 goals) in that mix; does he score enough, or does he pass too much? Brayden Point (111 goals) scores a lot of goals, but he’s also a disher at times, so I think it does take a certain amount of shot-first mentality if you’re going to challenge that many. Auston Matthews (151 goals) probably has to be in that conversation as well, the way he shoots the puck.”

If Pastrnak can consistently score 50+ goals a season, we are looking at about 10 more years before we see a then 34-year old Pastrnak flirt with 700 goals.

For the time being, we are going to enjoy what Pastrnak is doing now and enjoy his first 40-goal campaign.

“That means he’s moving forward,” Cassidy said of Pastrnak reaching the 40-goal mark “That’s what you want, your younger players to keep taking steps. There’s a lot of growth in his game that I like. Obviously, we want to see him continue to score; it helps us win games.”

As Marchand mentioned, Pastrnak has improved the defensive side of his game, adding another weapon to his arsenal. His emphasis on being better in the d-zone was on display Wednesday night, adding to what was an all-around A+ night from Pastrnak.

Pastrnak’s second goal of the night was a play he started himself in the d-zone, and finished in the o-zone.