{"id":685375,"date":"2026-10-12T23:57:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-12T23:57:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/685375\/"},"modified":"2026-10-12T23:57:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-12T23:57:12","slug":"charlie-mcavoy-ready-to-get-back-in-the-fight-with-bruins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/685375\/","title":{"rendered":"Charlie McAvoy Ready to Get Back \u2018In The Fight\u2019 With Bruins"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Boston Bruins<\/a> are getting their best defenseman back on Tuesday night, and Marco Sturm<\/a> was quick to pair him with the next-best option.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Charlie McAvoy<\/a> skated alongside Hampus Lindholm<\/a> at practice on Monday afternoon in San Jose, according to the lines<\/a> shared by Belle Fraser<\/a> of BostonBruins.com. McAvoy just finished serving his six-game suspension after a slash to Buffalo Sabres forward Zach Benson<\/a> at the end of the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a really long time. Long time for me, but I got to go through the camp with everybody, so I guess, in that capacity, it definitely did feel short and different from normal, but it\u2019s almost like ramping up to go nowhere fast is what it kind of felt like,\u201d McAvoy said to reporters in San Jose. \u201cI\u2019m really excited to be back. The guys have been doing a great job. So I\u2019m really excited to just rejoin a team that\u2019s starting to find their stride and playing really good.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

McAvoy was with the team when they took the ice on September 17 for training camp. He was limited to just two preseason games, both of which he skated with Frederic Brunet<\/a>, before his suspension kicked in at the start of the regular season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

McAvoy remained at practice with the team throughout the suspension, skating on the fourth pair with either Brunet or Jonathan Aspirot<\/a>. He started rotating back into power play reps last week at Warrior Ice Arena, and NESN\u2019s Adam Pellerin<\/a> reported that he skated with the top unit on Monday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Despite the extra practice time, McAvoy knows that nothing can replace the in-game experience.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, I feel good. I think we tried to make the most of it,\u201d McAvoy said. \u201cI feel really strong, I feel really good with where my body is at. Conditioning is tough, you know, we worked really hard on the ice, and you stay out after and do all those bag skates and stuff, but really nothing can replace the game, so tomorrow I know I\u2019ll be keeping my shifts short and trying to get in and acclimate pretty quickly.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Bruins\u2019 alternate captain watched from the ninth floor as the black and gold embarked on their first six games of the season. They blanked his childhood team, the New York Rangers, on opening night, then rebounded from back-to-back losses with back-to-back wins by a combined score of 11-2.\u00a0<\/p>\n

McAvoy, understandably, was not the biggest fan of being on the ninth floor. However, he said Monday that it gave him a different view of the game.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI guess it\u2019s a little bit [of] both. Like, I think you can grab perspective [from the ninth floor], but I do hate doing it. So I think it was both,\u201d McAvoy said. \u201cI think you have to remember that sometimes everything looks really easy from up there, so I guess it\u2019s nice perspective to see it from that bird\u2019s-eye view, but it isn\u2019t fun being up there. So I\u2019m really excited to be back down on the ice and in the fight with the guys.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

McAvoy and Hampus Lindholm have skated together before, including for 137:19 at 5-on-5 last season. They owned a 55.6% share of shot attempts, and they outscored opponents 10-3, according to Natural Stat Trick<\/a>. Over 516 minutes together across the last three seasons, Lindholm and McAvoy have outscored opponents 30-16 and owned a 54.98% share of shot attempts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, I\u2019ve played with Hammer before. I truly think I\u2019ve played with everybody before, having gotten some reps with [Brunet] in the preseason. So I think I can say I have played with everybody,\u201d McAvoy said. \u201cAnd no matter who I\u2019m with, my job always stays the same: to be the absolute best that I can be and try and elevate my partner.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s make each other\u2019s lives easier. If it\u2019s Hammer tomorrow and someone else moving forward, that doesn\u2019t change. Just try and be the very best I can be.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

McAvoy led Bruins defensemen with a career-high 61 points (11-50\u201361) last season. He is the Bruins\u2019 top option on the blue line, but he knows that playing with Lindholm gives him more freedom offensively.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, I think, you know, going to try and get involved. I love that side of the game and try and do it responsibly,\u201d McAvoy said. \u201cI know he does open that up for me being so good defensively as he is, but I know he likes to go sometimes, too. So we\u2019ll take care of each other, and yeah, I\u2019m excited to get going.\u201d<\/p>\n

McAvoy and the Bruins will start their four-game road trip on Tuesday night at SAP Center in San Jose. They then visit Anaheim, Los Angeles, and Dallas before returning home to play Nashville on October 22.\u00a0<\/p>\n

FOLLOW @JACKSTUDLEY13 ON \ud835\udd4f<\/a>\u00a0 | FOLLOW @BOSHockeyNow ON \ud835\udd4f<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Boston Bruins are getting their best defenseman back on Tuesday night, and Marco Sturm was quick to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":685376,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5127],"tags":[68757,95,2154,29692,6525,5,40692,4,519,168,5306,5305,1780,4023],"class_list":["post-685375","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose-sharks","tag-2026-27-regular-season","tag-boston-bruins","tag-charlie-mcavoy","tag-frederic-brunet","tag-hampus-lindholm","tag-hockey","tag-jonathan-aspirot","tag-nhl","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-sharks","tag-sanjose","tag-sanjosesharks","tag-sharks","tag-zach-benson"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/117430651639341059","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685375","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=685375"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685375\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/685376"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=685375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=685375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=685375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}