BOSTON — Jake DeBrusk played most of the second half of the season with a broken left hand.
The Bruins forward had been concealing the injury as he tried to play through it. But after Friday’s season-ending loss to the Florida Panthers, he admitted he’d been less than 100 percent.
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DeBrusk suffered the injury just before the Bruins’ Jan. 27 win at Philadelphia. He missed that game, but the Bruins’ bye week followed allowing him to get himself comfortable enough to play. He had just one goal in February, but appeared to get stronger in March as he scored five of his 19 goals in that month.
“I was dealing with some injuries. I broke my hand right before the bye week. It didn’t really heal probably until a week out of playoffs,” he said. “It was frustrating, just feeling limited. I tried to play through it. Hoping to help the team out in different ways with penalty killing and stuff like that. I knew I was going to have a good playoffs.”
DeBrusk led the Bruins with 11 playoff points with three goals and eight assists. His no-look backhand cross-ice pass launched Pavel Zacha for the Bruins’ only goal in Friday’s 2-1 loss.
The 27-year-old will be an unrestricted free agent for the first time after the season. But he declined to talk about his future after the game.
