The Boston Bruins have retained former U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch to conduct an independent review of their player-vetting process after they signed prospect Mitchell Miller and then cut ties with him two days later amid intense backlash.
The Bruins announced on Tuesday that Lynch, of the law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, will “conduct an independent review of our player-vetting process” and ensure that “our process going forward reflects our core values.”
Boston said it will fully cooperate with the review and will publicly disclose the results.
“The Boston Bruins strive every day to live our values and meet the high standards our associates, fans and community have come to expect,” the Bruins said in a statement released Tuesday. “This includes treating everyone inside and outside our organization with dignity and respect. We recently fell short of our high standards and disappointed both ourselves and many in our community.”
The Bruins signed Miller, a 20-year-old defenseman, to an entry-level contract on Nov. 4 with the intention of sending him to AHL Providence. The team, however, announced on Nov. 6 that it was cutting ties with Miller after intense backlash from fans, the team’s players and NHL commissioner Gary Bettman.
Miller remains under contract with the team and is technically still a member of Providence. Among the options for the Bruins: pay Miller to stay home for this season and then buy him out at the end of the year for one-third of his NHL salary; or to work with Miller and the NHLPA on a settlement that would allow him to become a free agent.
He was a fourth-round pick of the Arizona Coyotes in 2020, but his draft rights were relinquished when a story was published about how he and another middle school classmate were convicted in juvenile court in 2016 of assaulting and bullying Isaiah Meyer-Crothers, a Black classmate with developmental disabilities.
In the report, Meyer-Crothers’ mother alleged Miller began abusing her son in second grade and repeatedly used racial slurs. Miller admitted in an Ohio juvenile court that he used racial epithets against Meyer-Crothers, physically assaulted him and at one point tricked him into “licking a candy push pop that Miller and another boy had wiped in a bathroom urinal,” according to a police report.
Fans were outraged by the signing of Miller, and Bruins veterans such as Nick Foligno and Patrice Bergeron expressed disappointment. Bettman reiterated Miller wasn’t cleared by his office to play for the Bruins and “I can’t tell you that he’ll ever be eligible to come into the NHL.”
On Nov. 7, Boston president Cam Neely expressed concern over failures in the team’s vetting process in signing Miller. He cited “new information” when the team walked away from Miller on Nov. 6. Neely said the fact that the Bruins never reached out to the family of Meyer-Crothers “was concerning” and that it was “absolutely” a problem with the team’s vetting process.
The Penguins’ captain tied Hall of Famer Joe Sakic at 1,641 points with an assist on Bryan Rust‘s first-period goal. Crosby then moved past Sakic with an assist on Drew O’Connor‘s sixth goal of the season later in the period as the Penguins raced to a 4-1 advantage.
Crosby’s 12th goal 5:42 into the second put the Penguins up 5-1, providing some welcome wiggle room for a team that has struggled to hold multiple-goal leads this season.
The next name ahead of Crosby on the career scoring list is none other than Penguins icon Mario Lemieux, who had 1,723 points.
“I’m running out of superlatives [about Crosby],” Penguins coach Mike Sullivan told reporters after the game. “What he’s accomplishing, first of all, his body of work in the league, his legacy that has been built to this point, speaks for itself. He’s the consummate pro. He just represents our sport, the league, the Pittsburgh Penguins in such a great way.
“He just carries himself with so much grace and humility and integrity. And he’s a fierce competitor on the ice.”
Rust also had a goal and two assists for Pittsburgh, which snapped a three-game losing streak by beating the Oilers for the first time since Dec. 20, 2019.
“For us, that was our goal — to be on our toes, be all over them, be on top of them, because they’re very fast, a skilled team,” Rust told reporters after the game. “I think just a result of that was us being able to get some offense.”
McDavid finished with three assists. Leon Draisaitl scored twice to boost his season total to an NHL-best 31, but the Penguins beat Stuart Skinner four times in the first 14 minutes. Skinner settled down to finish with 21 saves but it wasn’t enough as the Penguins ended Edmonton’s four-game winning streak.
TAKEAWAYS
Oilers: Their attention to detail in the first period was shaky. Though Skinner wasn’t at his best, the Penguins also had little trouble generating chances.
Penguins: Pittsburgh remains a work in progress at midseason but showed it can compete with the league’s best.
UP NEXT
Edmonton finishes a four-game trip at Chicago on Saturday. The Penguins continue a five-game homestand Saturday against Ottawa.
ST. PAUL, Minn. — The Minnesota Wild have added defensemen Jonas Brodin and Brock Faber to their list of key injured players, leaving them out of the lineup for their game against Colorado on Thursday night.
Brodin’s status is day to day. He has a lower-body injury from blocking a shot late in the 6-4 win over St. Louis on Tuesday night. Wild coach John Hynes had no update after the team’s morning skate on Thursday on the timetable for the return of Faber, who has an upper-body injury from an elbow he took from Blues forward Jake Neighbours at the end of his first shift.
The Wild already were missing captain Jared Spurgeon (lower body), who is expected to be out for another week or two after taking a slew foot from Nashville forward Zachary L’Heureux in their game on Dec. 31. That leaves Minnesota without three of its top four defensemen. Jake Middleton just returned from a 10-game absence because of an upper-body injury.
The Wild also have been without star left wing Kirill Kaprizov (lower body), who missed his seventh straight game on Thursday. Kaprizov, who is tied for fourth in the NHL with 23 goals and ninth in the league with 50 points, has skated on the last two days and could return soon.
The Columbus Blue Jackets placed forward Sean Monahan on injured reserve Thursday because of an upper body injury sustained in the 4-3 shootout win at Pittsburgh on Tuesday.
Adam Fantilli is expected to move up to center the top line when the Blue Jackets host the Seattle Kraken on Thursday.
“Guys have watched how [Monahan] conducts himself, and hopefully they try to do the exact same thing,” coach Dean Evason said Thursday. “Our bench is calm in large part because of him up front and [defenseman Zach Werenski] on the back end. They’re both very calming influence players, but we have other guys that do that as well.
“But if the guys that are playing in tonight’s hockey game have learned anything from ‘Monny,’ it’s that he’s even-keeled. He doesn’t get too high, too low, all those clichés. He just goes about his business. We expect our team to do that here tonight.”
In a corresponding move, the Blue Jackets added rookie forward Owen Sillinger on an emergency recall from the AHL’s Cleveland Monsters.
Monahan, 30, has 41 points (14 goals, 27 assists), 14 penalty minutes and a plus-17 rating in 41 games this season. He ranks second on the team in plus/minus rating and third in goals, assists and points.
He has 579 career points (258 goals, 321 assists) in 805 games with the Calgary Flames (2013-22), Montreal Canadiens (2022-24), Winnipeg Jets (2024) and Blue Jackets, who signed him as a free agent in July. The Flames selected him sixth overall in the 2013 NHL draft.
Sillinger, 27, is on a one-year, two-way NHL/AHL contract with the Blue Jackets. He has eight goals and 17 assists with 18 penalty minutes in 34 games with Cleveland this season.
