Bruins have built tall, heavy roster with eye toward playoff success

Bruins have built tall, heavy roster with eye toward playoff success originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

The Boston Bruins have been, for much of their 100-year history, known as a big and tough team that isn’t afraid to throw its weight around all over the ice. The Stanley Cup-winning teams of the 1970s with Bobby Orr and Co. and the Ray Bourque/Cam Neely-led teams in the 1980s epitomized the franchise’s “Big Bad Bruins” mantra.

Today’s NHL is more focused on skill and speed compared to those previous decades. But even if size and strength aren’t the No. 1 objectives when building a roster, those attributes remain very important, especially in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

The Bruins have lost to a tougher, more physical team in the Florida Panthers each of the last two playoff runs. The Panthers play a fierce style of hockey and often grind their way to hard-fought victories. Sometimes they go over the line, but they’re very hard to play against, and that’s before you factor in the incredible amount of offensive skill Florida has on its roster.

Bruins general manager Don Sweeney and his staff went into the offseason and made the roster taller, heavier and meaner. As a result, the Bruins should be a more difficult team to play against. In this way, and others, the roster is better suited for the physical challenges of the postseason than some of the previous iterations.

How do you measure size and physicality? How does Boston stack up to the rest of the league? Well, consider this: As of Oct. 4, the Bruins are the NHL’s second-tallest team as well as the heaviest team, per Elite Prospects.

The Bruins’ average height is 189.17 centimeters (6-foot-2), which is just 0.1 centimeters shorter than the Vegas Golden Knights. Boston is the heaviest team with an average weight of 209 pounds, two pounds ahead of the Toronto Maple Leafs. The Bruins, Golden Knights and New York Islanders are the only three teams in the top five of both average height and weight.

“I think…