Bruins acquire defenseman Andrew Peeke, trading away Jakub Zboril

BOSTON -- After adding some size to their forward group, the Bruins added some of that to their back end.

The Bruins acquired defenseman Andrew Peeke from the Blue Jackets on Friday, ahead of the NHL trade deadline.The Bruins sent Jakub Zboril and a third-round pick to Columbus in the deal.

The 25-year-old Peeke is in his fifth NHL season, spending his entire career with the Blue Jackets, who drafted him with the 34th overall pick in 2016. The 6-foot-3, right-shot defenseman has 10 goals, 32 assists and a minus-60 rating in 218 career games. (The bulk of the hit of that plus-minus rating came last year, when Peeke was an NHL-worst minus-41 for a Blue Jackets team that ranked 31st in goals allowed.)

Prior to the trade, Peeke had been averaging just 15:37 of ice time in his 23 games this season, his lowest average ice time since his rookie season. 

Peeke has a year left on his contract beyond this season and is due $2.75 million next year.

Zboril was drafted by the Bruins in 2015, Don Sweeney's first draft as GM of Boston, and was the first of three consecutive picks in the middle of the first round, ahead of Jake DeBrusk and Zach Senyshyn. Zboril's played in just 76 NHL games in his career, scoring a goal and registering 15 assists with an even plus-minus rating. The left-shot defenseman has played in 31 games for AHL Providence this season. He's set to become an unrestricted free agency this coming offseason.