Bruins vs. Islanders Preview: Pile on the Isle?

Just the Facts:

Game Time: 7:30 PM, Nassau Veterans Memorial Mausoleum Coliseum. TV Broadcast: NBC Sports Network (sorry, guys.) Radio Broadcast: 98.5 The Sports Hub

The Other Side's SB Nation Site: Lighthouse Hockey (Preview here)

Records: Bruins (11-2-2, 4th in the East) vs. Islanders (8-10-1, 13th in the East)

Get tickets here: Boston Bruins Tickets

Projected Islanders lines:

Boyes - Tavares - Moulson
Bailey - Nielsen - Okposo
Ullstrom - Reasoner - Grabner
MacDonald - Cizikas - Martin

Hamonic - McDonald
Streit - Martinek
Visnovsky - Hickey

Nabokov
Poulin

Projected Bruins lines:

Lucic - Krejci - Horton
Marchand - Bergeron - Seguin
Bourque - Kelly - Peverley
Paille - Campbell - Thornton

Chara - Boychuk
Seidenberg - Hamilton
Ference - McQuaid

Rask
Khudobin

Preview:

Wow, the Islanders. They've played ten games at home so far this season and their record in their own building is 2-8-0. That's pretty sad. Coach Jack Capuano has intelligently benched the only guy to look stellar against the Bruins this year (Waltham's own Keith Aucoin!) in favor of David Ullstrom, so that's good for our side. In net, we no longer have Rick DiPietro to torture, as he's now one of the two goalies on the Islanders' roster occupying 8.5 million dollars in cap space who likely won't play another game this season....hello, Tim Thomas.

Up front, the Isles have made a few changes to their forward lines for tonight's game; the second and third lines have been shuffled from their last game. Old pal Brad Boyes is playing left wing to their only real star player, John Tavares, at center; on their left is (Mighty) Matt Moulson.

On the Bruins' side - well, they're coming off a stellar Florida sweep that we all enjoyed immensely. They've killed 21 straight penalties, scoring as many goals as they've allowed on the PK, and their road power play has actually begun to show signs of life. Remember for a while the Islanders were the only other team not to allow a goal on the PK? Since then, they've dropped to 8th best in the league, having killed 84% of penalties. It's no 94%, but hey, we can't all be perfect.

Evgeni Nabokov gets the start in net tonight; he is 4-4-1 all time against the Bruins. Opposite him in net will likely be Tuukka Rask. Game time is 7:30. Let's do this.

Never Forget:

let's go old-school with this one.