BOSTON – Two years ago, to the day, Morgan Geekie was in limbo.
The Manitoba native had just set career highs in goals (nine) and points (28) during the 2022-23 campaign, but the Seattle Kraken opted not to extend a qualifying offer to the restricted free agent, leaving him to the open market.
Enter the Boston Bruins.
A day later, on July 1 – the opening day of free agency – the Black & Gold inked Geekie to a two-year contract with a $2 million annual cap hit.
And what a two years it’s proven to be for the now 26-year-old forward.
Geekie tallied 17 goals and 39 points across 76 games in 2023-24, before exploding for another career campaign in 2024-25 with 33 goals and 57 points in 77 games.
Last season’s stellar showing earned him Seventh Player Award honors – and, ultimately, a new six-year contract extension with a cap hit of $5.5 million that was announced by the Bruins late Sunday night.
“It’s crazy. When I came into the league as a rookie, I remember talking to all my friends that you just want to play as long as you can,” said Geekie. “It was a tough time a couple years ago, kind of stuck in limbo, not being qualified. I think things kind of just played out as they were meant to play out and that’s what brought me to Boston. I wouldn’t change anything else.
“It’s definitely tough to comprehend and hard to believe, but I’m super grateful to be in Boston for six years. I love the group of guys that we have so that was one of the big things for me was the guys and the culture here.
“The organization doesn’t get enough credit for just how important that is to bringing guys back and wanting to be a part of this group.”
Geekie developed immense chemistry with David Pastrnak over the second half of last season, tallying 31 of his 33 goals after Dec. 1. Only Pastrnak (35), Edmonton’s Leon Draisaitl (35), and Buffalo’s Tage Thompson (33) produced more tallies than Geekie in that time frame.
“Me and Dave get along really well off the ice, which helps a lot,” said Geekie, who added that the addition of Elias Lindholm to their line down the stretch helped them to focus more on offensive production.
“Whenever you play with someone for a sustained period of time, obviously your chemistry builds naturally. But we played a little bit together the previous year in the playoffs, under a little bit different circumstances. It’s good. I don’t think it’s one of those things that needs to continue to grow. I think naturally, with a friendship, that’s what happens and you start to pick up on each other’s tendencies and we did that pretty well.
“But I think our whole line of [Elias Lindholm] and [Pavel Zacha, I thought we clicked pretty well with the two of us. Just try to keep building on what I had accomplished at the end of the year and roll it into the fall.”