The Boston Bruins named Jeremy Swayman as their starting goaltender for Thursday’s game against the St. Louis Blues, one night after Carolina ended Boston’s eight-game point streak.
Puck drop is set for 8 p.m. EDT at Enterprise Center. Michael DiPietro is expected to back up Swayman, while the Blues are projected to start Joel Hofer, who is 4-3-1 with a 2.40 goals-against average.
Swayman faced 30 shots in Tuesday’s 2-1 loss in Raleigh and stopped 28 of them for a .933 save percentage in 57:47 of ice time. Pavel Zacha gave Boston a 1-0 lead with a power-play goal just 1:31 into the game. Jackson Blake and Sebastian Aho answered for the Hurricanes, and the Bruins never scored again.
Swayman is 4-2-0 in six career games against St. Louis, with a 2.84 goals-against average and a .882 save percentage. He has stopped 127 of 144 shots in those meetings.
His results against the Blues show a clear reverse home-road split. He has won all four starts in St. Louis and lost both starts at home against them, allowing four goals each time. He surrendered two goals in each of his last two visits to Enterprise Center, both victories.
The Bruins enter at 9-3-1 and hold a three-point lead in the Atlantic Division. They average 3.77 goals per game, fourth-best in the NHL, and allow 2.15 goals per game, the second-fewest in the league. Boston has won seven of its last nine contests.
St. Louis is 5-6-1 and has been shut out in consecutive games. The Blues have gone 123:55 without scoring, including a stretch in which they managed 46 shots against Montreal goalie Jacob Fowler on Tuesday but still left scoreless. Coach Jim Montgomery has shuffled his top three lines.
Swayman has made 10 starts this season and owns a 2.19 goals-against average, a .921 save percentage and one shutout. He has turned aside 257 of 279 shots. His seven wins rank third in the NHL.
Over his last five outings, he is 3-1-1 with a .911 save percentage. The 27-year-old is trending upward after a difficult 2024-25 campaign in which he went 22-29-7 with a 3.11 goals-against average and a .892 save percentage. Last season he posted a career-high 31 wins and earned a Vezina Trophy nomination.
Swayman was born Nov. 24, 1998, in Anchorage, Alaska. The Bruins selected him in the fourth round, 111th overall, in the 2017 draft out of the USHL’s Sioux Falls Stampede. He spent three seasons at the University of Maine, where he won the Mike Richter Award as the top college goaltender in 2019-20.
He signed an eight-year, $66 million contract with Boston in October 2024. His career record stands at 139-82-27 in 255 NHL games, with a 2.59 goals-against average, a .910 save percentage and 19 shutouts.
A victory Thursday would split the two-game road trip and improve the Bruins to 10-3-1 with 21 points. Boston swept last season’s series with a pair of 5-2 wins, and the teams meet again Dec. 17 in Boston. Defenseman Brandon Carlo will face the club that traded him to Toronto at the 2025 deadline.
