A long Eastern Conference rivalry between the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Boston Bruins is about to start game one of an eight game series. The Penguins led by NHL vet Sidney Crosby and young star Jake Guentzel will look to extend their record to 5-2-0 against Brad Marchand and captain Patrice Bergeron as the Bruins look to extend their record to 4-1-1. Here is what we know about the match-up so far.
Both Pittsburgh and Boston have some notable players out. Boston's list consists of:
Matt Grzelcyk, questionable
Ondrej Kase, out
David Pastrnak, out
Pittsburgh's list has:
Jusso Rikola, out
Mike Matheson, out
Zach Aston-Reeese, out
Marcus pettersson, out
Boston has some more serious injuries to their team and it hasn’t seemed to affect them so far this season, especially the last two games where they broke out the scoring with eleven goals, nine of them coming from even-strength.
Based on the injury reports here is the projected rosters.
BOS:
Brad Marchand - Patrice Bergeron - Jake Debrusk
Nick Ritchie - David Krejci - Jack Studnicka
Trent Frederic - Charlie Coyle - Craig Smith
Anders Bjork - Sean Kuraly - Chris Wagner
Jeremy Lauzon - Charlie McAvoy
Matt Grzelcyk - Brandon Carlo
Jakub Zboril - Kevan Miller
Tuukka Rask
Jaroslav Halak
PIT:
Jake Guentzel - Sidney Crosby - Evan Rodrigues
Jared McCann - Evgeni Malkin - Bryan Rust
Jason Zucker - Teddy Blueger - Kasperi Kapanen
Brandon Tanev - Mark Jankowski - Colton Sceviour
Brian Domoulin - Kris Letang
John Marino - Cody Ceci
Pierrei Oliver Joseph - Chad Ruhwedel
Tristan Jarry
Casey DeSmith
I would expect Tuukka Rask to get the start tomorrow as Jaroslav Halak was in net during the 6-1 win over the Flyers. Rask has been really good as of late and so has Halak.
On the other side Tristan Jarry started off rough and shocked a lot of the NHL but he has since picked up his play. Casey DeSmith has been quite good in the few starts he has gotten this year. Both teams have good tandems but I feel the Bruins will be better on the goaltending end of things.
The Defense is close but again, I feel Boston is just better in this end as well. Pittsburgh is also missing some guys so it will be difficult for them and Boston may be missing Matt Grzlecyk. When more updates come we should get a better understanding of it but for now I am giving this one to Boston.
I also like the way Boston’s offense is compared to the Penguins. The depth should help us along with good performances from young guys. Newly acquired Kasperi Kapanen should start to produce for PIT as well and could be playing alongside Sidney Crosby sooner or later per Mike Sullivan. Boston is missing highly effective Right Wingers, Ondrej Kase and David Pastrnak as well. I think the forward structure from both teams is definitely a strong point and Boston edges them out in this area. It is definitely the closest part of both teams but with Malkin not playing well and Boston coming off some hot games from lines one to four I am giving it to them.
After evaluating each roster and incorporating all the factors I think Boston is the better team going into this game. They will need to play a full sixty minute game like they did against the Flyers in order to take down the Penguins. Patrice Bergeron and Sidney Crosby will continue a long time battle in the faceoff circle. The only difference, Bergy has got the C. Get ready to see it all unfold Tuesday night at 7PM EST.
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