The Bruins are in The City of Brotherly Love to take on the Philadelphia Flyers at the Wells Fargo Center. There is no love lost between these two teams after the Bruins and Flyers met in a 7-game playoff series this past spring. This will be the first of four meetings between the teams and the first since the Flyers bounced the B's from the playoffs.
The Flyers are atop the Atlantic Division with a record of 15-6-4 and just two points back of the Washington Capitals for the top spot in the Eastern Conference 25 games in the '10-'11 campaign.
Philadelphia has been getting production from all over it's lineup. The Flyers have three players with double digit goal totals. Claude Giroux, who is having a break out year in Philly has 12, along with Danny Briere. Jeff Carter is one back of Giroux and Briere with 11 tallies on the season. Meanwhile Mike Richards has registered a point per game and leads the team with 25 points (9-16-25).
On the blue line, Chis Pronger continues to be an intimidating force at age 36 while former Bruin Sean O'Donnell leads the Orange & Black with a plus-17 at age 39.
On paper, goaltending has been a major issue for Philly the past few seasons, but they always seems to get the most out of their netminders. This year, 22-year old rookie Sergei Bobrovsky has seen the bulk of the goaltending load. Bobrovsky has appeared in 18 games while posting a 12-3-2 record, .926 save percentage, and 2.19 GAA. Backing up the Russian rookie is Rhode Island native Brian Boucher. Boucher has appeared in 8 games with a 3-3-2 record to go along with a .901 save percentage and 2.57 GAA. Michael Leighton, who played in 27 regular season games and 14 playoff games for the Flyers last season has been on the shelf all season after undergoing surgery to repair a herniated disk in his back. Leighton returned to practice earlier this week and has been sent to the Adirondack Phantoms for a six-day conditioning stint.
Besides Leighton, the Flyers will also be without defenseman Matt Walker (groin) and right winger Ian LaPerriere (post concussion symptoms). Resident goon and king of unintentional comedy, Daniel Carcillo (knee) returned to practice this week, but has not been cleared for contact yet. Chances are Carcillo will not play tonight. Word out of Philly is that the patchy-mustachioed scrapper may have trouble cracking the lineup when he is medically cleared to play.
On the Bruins injury front, Marc Savard is getting close to returning to the lineup, but will not be ready to go against Philly. Both David Krejci and Jordan Caron, who missed last game with flu-like symptoms will be back in the lineup tonight.
Notes:
- The Flyers and their fans clearly have better memories from Game 7 than the Bruins and their fans. The Flyers posted a bunch of content on their official website to relive the moments that Bruins fans would rather forget.
- The Flyers are 9-4-1 on home ice this season.
- Adam McQuaid will dress tonight after Matt Hunwick was traded to the Colorado Avalanche in exchange for Colby Cohen. McQuaid skated alongside Mark Stuart during Monday's practice in Wilmington. Cohen has been assigned to Providence.
- The Bruins have struggled on the power play lately and just 1 for their last 14 (7.1%).
- This game could come down to which team leads going into the first intermission. The Bruins are 7-0-0 when leading after the first period, while the Flyers are 9-1-0 when they have the lead after 20 minutes of play.
- Former UNH standout James van Riemsdyk will play in his 100th career NHL game tonight when he takes the ice for the Flyers.
- The game starts at 7:00 PM ET and will air on NESN and 98.5 FM The Sports Hub.
- The Public Skate open thread gets started a half hour prior to puck drop.
- For more on tonight's game check out Broad Street Hockey