Bruins to rely on young defensemen with Zdeno Chara off to Sochi

With Boston captain Zdeno Chara off to Sochi to carry the flag for Slovakia during the Opening Ceremony at the Olympics, the Bruins will be relying on a young and relatively inexperienced defense corps for their two remaining games prior to the break.

Only one defenseman scheduled to suit up against the St. Louis Blues on Thursday and the Ottawa Senators on Saturday has appeared in more than 200 NHL games, with the rest of the gang trailing far behind.

Here's what Claude Julien is expecting from the group (via CBS Boston).

I think you’re going to need a lot more than Johnny to be solid next game, and next two games, in order to win. I think it’s going to be important that our whole D corps does a good job there. So you can’t put all the burden on one guy’s shoulder. And as much Zee is a big part of that back end, other guys have done a great job in making our whole D corps pretty solid. So I would have to expect the same thing. But we all know that when you lose a guy like Zdeno it’s a big, big piece of your team. And then you move forward with it, and to me it’s an opportunity for us to maybe even [see] more how good we are as a team rather than looking at just individuals

As for the players, they've adopted a new nickname for Boychuk.