PREVIEW 8:30 AM EDT
In the third game of a thus-far winless five-game homestand, the Philadelphia Flyers (13-17-3) take on the Boston Bruins (21-7-4). Today's matinee starts at 1:00 p.m. and will be broadcast locally on CSN Philadelphia and nationally on NHL Network.
This is the second of three meetings between the teams this season, and the first of two in Philadelphia. On March 9, the Flyers offered little resistance to the Bruins in a 3-0 shutout loss in Boston.
Ever since the Flyers' staged their historic comeback from a three-games-to-none deficit in the 2010 Eastern Conference Semifinals, the Bruins have dominated Philadelphia. In the seasons that have followed, the Bruins have a combined regular season and playoff record of 11-1-1 against the Flyers.
The Flyers have had trouble beating pretty much anyone of late. The team has won just two of its last 10 games (2-6-2) and is coming off a frustrating game against the New York Islanders. In that match, the Flyers built a 2-0 lead only to see it slip away and turn into a late one-goal deficit in the third period. After Scott Hartnell's second power play goal of the game tied the game at 3-3 and forced overtime, the Flyers lost via a four-round shootout.
Boston has not been playing its best hockey of late, but remains one of the most formidable teams in the Eastern Conference. The club is 5-4-1 over its last 10 games. In their last game, the Bruins experienced plenty of frustration of their own in a seesaw affair with archrival Montreal that ended in a 6-5 shootout loss. The Bruins trailed 2-0, led 4-2 and 5-3, and then gave up two late goals to end up in overtime. The Habs scored the tying goal in the final 10 seconds. Montreal prevailed in a six-round shootout.
On the Flyer injury front, the team is missing half of its intended started blueline from the lineup. Andrej Meszaros and Braydon Coburn are both likely to miss the rest of the season with shoulder injuries. In the meantime, Nicklas Grossmann (upper torso) officially remains day-to-day after missing the last three games. However, he is still not ready to return. The team has called up big Danish defenseman Oliver Lauridsen to fill in.
PROJECTED LINEUPS (subject to change)
FLYERS
24 Matt Read - 28 Claude Giroux - 93 Jakub Voracek
19 Scott Hartnell - 10 Brayden Schenn - 17 Wayne Simmonds
25 Max Talbot - 14 Sean Couturier - 36 Zac Rinaldo
12 Simon Gagne - 26 Ruslan Fedotenko - 9 Mike Knuble
44 Kimmo Timonen - 22 Luke Schenn
29 Erik Gustafsson - 27 Bruno Gervais
38 Oliver Lauridsen - 3 Kurtis Foster
30 Ilya Bryzgalov
[49 Michael Leighton]
BRUINS
17 Milan Lucic - 46 David Krejci - 18 Nathan Horton
63 Brad Marchand - 13 Patrice Bergeron - 19 Tyler Seguin
29 Jay Pandolfo - 49 Rich Peverley - 38 Jordan Caron
20 Daniel Paille - 11 Gregory Campbell - 22 Shawn Thornton
33 Zdeno Chara - 27 Dougie Hamilton
45 Aaron Johnson- 44 Dennis Seidenberg
47 Torey Krug - 21 Andrew Ference
40 Tuukka Rask
[35 Anton Khudobin]
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