Zacha, Mittelstadt look to share dad jokes, help power playoff run for Bruins

BOSTON -- Pavel Zacha got word midway through the Boston Bruins’ final game of the regular season, on Tuesday against the New Jersey Devils, that his daughter was on the way. The Bruins forward shook a few hands, got a few congratulations, and headed out of TD Garden on the way to the hospital, where he would get a chance to meet Penelope Zacha, his first child. 

“It was weird leaving the game too, just completely different mindsets, leaving and then you have to refocus on something completely different,” Zacha said. “I’m happy everyone’s healthy, that’s all we could ask for there.”

It was a day later when Boston forward Casey Mittelstadt -- in slightly less dramatic fashion -- got to meet his first, a boy he and his fiancée named Macklin after a scheduled induction.

“Busy couple days,” Mittelstadt said. “But it’s been fun.”

It will only get more fun this week for the Zacha and Mittelstadt, members of the Bruins surprisingly productive and surprisingly reliable second line, as they try to ride the new-dad bounce into the Stanley Cup Playoffs, which begin with Game 1 of the Eastern Conference First around against the Buffalo Sabres at KeyBank Center. 

That goes double for Mittelstadt, who will be facing the team that selected him with the No. 8 pick in the 2017 NHL Draft, and for which he played his first seven seasons in the League. 

“Obviously, a lot of good friends there still, but put that on hold for the series,” Mittelstadt said. “I think I got to experience the city in crazy times, whether it’s Bills games or some Sabres games when I was there at least. So I know what the atmosphere is going to be like. It’s going to be nuts.

“So I think that’s going to be really fun for us, especially to go on the road to start and play the villain role early.”

The Bruins, who claimed the first wild card spot into the playoffs from the Eastern Conference, are here in large part because of Mittelstadt and Zacha, two-thirds of a second line -- along with Viktor Arvidsson -- that produced far more than almost anyone expected. 

Mittelstadt, whose move from center to wing kickstarted their chemistry, had 42 points (15 goals, 27 assists) in 71 games, while Arvidsson bounced back from seasons of 15 points in 2023-24 and 27 points last season to get 54 points (25 goals, 29 assists) in 69 games. 

But Zacha’s ascension might have been the most notable, with a career-high 65 points (30 goals, 35 assists) in 78 games.

“I think 'Pav' would tell you honestly that most of the people inside the organization would say, ‘We believe you’re capable of scoring 30 goals in this League,’ the way he can shoot a puck,” Boston general manager Don Sweeney said. “If he was a little more selfish in some situations, he does want to pass pucks and please other linemates, but he’s a hell of a player and on both sides of the puck.” 

That has been even more true since coming back from the Olympic break, when Zacha was forced by injury to rest, recover and prepare for the stretch run after it was determined he was not healthy enough to compete for Team Czechia at the 2026 Milano Cortina Olympics.

Zacha had 28 points (15 goals, 13 assists) in the Bruins' final 23 games, including an assist in the 4:58 he played Tuesday against the team that drafted him -- with the No. 6 pick in the 2015 NHL Draft -- before he headed to the hospital.

“He really used that time to get healthy, first and foremost, to have a rest,” Sweeney said. “His energy and his production coming out of the Olympics was massive for our group because there were other guys that weren’t. They were on the other side of that, and I think that gave him a hell of a lot of confidence to go out and produce at that level.”

And though coach Marco Sturm frequently played around with the first and third lines, swapping players in and out, it has been that second line that has played together almost exclusively this season, their play and their productivity a constant. 

“That’s what we wanted to focus on as a line," Zacha said, "build each game, keep getting better, and have our peak performance by the end of the year, hopefully make the playoffs. It’s great to be counted for in these situations, being needed as a line. We just have to deliver.”

That will be all the more important against Buffalo. 

“We’ve played a lot of different spots this year, a lot of different ways, but I think we’ve done well,” Mittelstadt said. “As a player, I think you want to be the guy, you want to be out there in those moments and you want to play on a line that has to do a big job and be a big part of it. I think we’ve done a good job of that this year.”

The plan is to continue that into the playoffs, starting with Game 1. But though the preparations on the ice are underway, Zacha and Mittelstadt, who kept passing each other in the hallway at the hospital and who traveled to Warrior Ice Arena together on Thursday morning, are also preparing to welcome their kids home before they head to Buffalo. 

“Now we’re three doors down,” said Zacha, who got to meet Macklin Mittelstadt on Wednesday. “It was really nice that we could both be there and experience the same thing. It’s really cool.”