The headlines this time last year were brutal.

“Is there anything to be salvaged from this fiasco?” asked Seeking Alpha. “Boardwalk Pipeline Partners springs a leak,” said Barron’s. At Midstream Business, the explanation was succinct—and dire: “Boardwalk slashes distribution rate by 81%.”

In the mind of an MLP investor, the asset class exists to distribute cash to them on a quarterly basis. Consequently, when Boardwalk Pipeline Partners LP (NYSE: BWP) slashed its distribution from $2.13 per year to 40 cents per year, unit prices plunged 46%.

But based on some organic growth, a project backlog of about $1.5 billion and fee-based design, by the end of February 2015, units were hovering around $16 each for most of the month. This was in the wake of a 52-week low of $11.99 per unit and a 52-week high of $20.51.

As it turns out, the company did exactly what it said it would do when it made the drastic announcement last year: The business cut distributions to reinvest in capital projects that would shore up the company’s bottom line. Boardwalk made good on its pledge to use the freed-up cash. In September, the Houston-based MLP bought the Evangeline ethylene pipeline system from Chevron Corp. (NYSE: CVX) for $295 million that would add 176 miles of interstate pipeline capable of moving roughly 2.6 billion pounds of ethylene every year between Port Neches, Texas, and Baton Rouge, La. In Baton Rouge it connects up with subsidiary Boardwalk Louisiana Midstream’s ethylene distribution system and storage facility at the Choctaw Hub. The line is supported by long-term, fee-based contracts.

Also last fall, Gulf South Pipeline Co., another Boardwalk subsidiary, established 20-year firm precedent agreements with foundation shippers to transport about 1.4 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas to serve the first two trains of the liquefaction terminal at Freeport LNG Development LP.

CNBC’s Jim Cramer noted that the pipeline business is all about “location, location, location. And Boardwalk has some of the best locations in the business.”

Credit Suisse Group AG (NYSE: CS) may be the most faithful in Boardwalk’s return to easy street.

“It’s been a pretty solid turnaround story due to the number of pipeline contract wins they’ve secured over the last year,” John Edwards, director and senior equities analysts for MLPs at Credit Suisse, told Midstream Business. “Part of it was combination of things—with such tremendous production out of the Northeast, there was a lot of demand to get production to places where it could be utilized. The production is outrunning what the local market up there can handle. Also part of it is just serendipity. Their assets are in locations that enable them to provide some useful services.”

Still, the climb ahead is a long one. Credit Suisse is modeling that by 2017, Boardwalk’s distributions will be close to $1.60 annually—better than the current 40-cents a year, but still 80% less than January 2014.

“That’s not all the way back, but at this point, that’s probably as good a marker for taking distributions to a more traditional level, where instead of having 4-times coverage, you’re going to be more on the 1- to 1.2-times coverage,” Edwards said.

Credit Suisse has handed Boardwalk an “Outperform” rating with a target price of $25 per unit.

Edwards explained, “It’s hard for us to see that’s there’s much in the way of downside left, and the risks appear skewed to the upside. They are able to execute on a number of the successful open seasons, and implement some of these new projects. It looks to us like they ought to be able to restore their distribution to more normalized levels in a couple of years. So when you run that through a net present value calculation, it gets you a fairly significant upside.”

Still, he admitted, “There are risks to the call: The risks are if things don’t materialize quite as quickly as we’re expecting or perhaps some of the contract roll-offs—if more of that happens and let’s say, they’re not able to take things back up until 2018, there would be valuation downside risk on the order of about $3 or $4.”

Other analysts are opting closer to the lower range. At Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS), Boardwalk buys are in a holding pattern with a target price of $19 per unit. The company’s practice of not providing forward EBITDA/distribution guidance limits visibility into 2015 financials.

“The contracting/growth situation at BWP continues to stabilize and we acknowledge long-term value, but lack of visibility and a resumption of distribution growth keeps us on the sidelines,” the analysts said in a research note.

At Raymond James Financial Inc. (NYSE: RJF), analysts say they believe the worst is behind Boardwalk, but they declined to put a target price on future units.

“Looking ahead, we’re focused on: 1) enhancing a largely fee-based cash flow profile; 2) organic growth initiatives; 3) improving financial metrics; and 4) the ability to leverage a strong sponsor (diversified holding company Loews Corp.),” RayJa said. “While balancing the aforementioned risk/reward proposition, we are maintaining out ‘Market Perform’ rating.”

Deon Daugherty can be reached at ddaugherty@hartenergy.com or 713-260-1065.