After all the speculation, it appears that the Bruins are keeping things simple in net: Jaroslav Halak will, in all likelihood, start again.
Officially, Cassidy said he’d have a few game-time decisions, one of which would be in net. Still, he also said “Halak is scheduled to start...he did not skate on the ice today so he’s recovered well.”
There you have it!
Interestingly, Cassidy alluded to some other potential changes, specifically on defense:
“We may have to dress seven D tonight,” he said. “We’ve kind of contemplated that going into the back-to-back. We’ll make a decision by game time.”
It’s worth remembering that Tampa has already gone with the 11F-7D set-up in this series.
Logically, if Cassidy decides to go that route, Jeremy Lauzon maybe a good fit, as he played relatively recently. John Moore could also be an option.
If the Bruins elect to take out a forward, who would it be? Hard to say. Anders Bjork? Joakim Nordstrom? Sean Kuraly?
Your guess is as good as ours.
Keep in mind that these are very speculative, but...here:
Forwards
Brad Marchand - Patrice Bergeron - David Pastrnak
Jake DeBrusk - David Krejci - Ondrej Kase
Nick Ritchie - Charlie Coyle - Anders Bjork
Joakim Nordstrom - Sean Kuraly - Chris Wagner
Defense
Zdeno Chara - Charlie McAvoy
Torey Krug - Brandon Carlo
Matt Grzelcyk - Connor Clifton/Jeremy Lauzon/John Moore
Jaroslav Halak should be in net, but let’s keep our minds open.
For the Lightning, Ryan McDonagh and Steven Stamkos remain out. Assuming they don’t overhaul anything, you can expect the lines to look like this:
Forwards
Ondrej Palat - Brayden Point - Nikita Kucherov
Alex Killorn - Anthony Cirelli - Tyler Johnson
Barclay Goodrow - Yanni Gourde - Blake Coleman
Patrick Maroon - Cedric Paquette - Carter Verhaeghe
Defense
Victor Hedman - Zach Bogosian
Mikhail Sergachev - Kevin Shattenkirk
Braydon Coburn - Erik Cernak
Goalies
Andrei Vasilevskiy
Should Jon Cooper decide to get wild, Curtis McElhinney is Vasilevskiy’s back-up.