Finally, it's done, with a year to spare.
Brad Marchand, one of the most crucial players to his team in the NHL, has decided his future lies where his entire NHL past has - in Boston.
The 28-year-old winger - one of the NHL's premier forwards and certainly among its most polarizing players, especially if you're a fan of any one of the 29 other teams - is a player the TD Garden crowd have seen mature from gritty energy forward to premier scoring threat to the all that and also the second coming of Esa Tikkanen.