After a thrilling 3-2 overtime win on Monday against the Utah Mammoth, the Ducks look to carry their momentum into a matchup with the Boston Bruins. The Bruins are coming off a 3-1 loss to the Carolina Hurricanes on Monday, but have won nine of their last 12 games.
The previous Ducks-Bruins matchup in Boston on Oct. 23 was an offensive showcase, with the two teams combining to score 12 goals. The Ducks came out victorious in that game, thanks to multi-point performances from Nikita Nesterenko and Mikael Granlund.
“It was a fun one,” Nesterenko said. “(I) played at BC, so I’m from the area there. I think my line was clicking that night. Granlund had a career night, five points too. (Troy Terry) was playing great. It was 7-5 that game, so it was a lot of scoring. Hopefully, we can continue the offense in this one, but keep the pucks out of our net.”
“It probably helped us when we played (Anaheim), getting scored on a lot of goals,” Bruins head coach Marco Sturm said. “ So that means we had to fix something defensively, and that’s pretty much what we did. I think there were still some questions out there; we answered them pretty clearly the following days and since then, it’s been much better.”
“That’s one of those games where pucks were going in at both ends at an unusual rate,” Ducks head coach Joel Quenneville said. “I think, ‘Hey we’ve got to play the game that’s in front of you,, but, at the same time, don’t expect that type of game tonight. I think we want to make sure that we’re respectful for what they can do offensively. I think we had a stretch of six games where we had a high number of goals, but now we’re having trouble scoring. That’s basically the way the game is. Every game’s gonna be tight, close checking. Very meaningful two points for everybody on a nightly basis. These guys kind of went after that game against us. They went on a nice little run, so I’m sure they’re excited about starting a trip off.”
Quenneville has preached the importance of having strong starts to their game. Defenseman Olen Zellweger echoed those thoughts during his postgame media scrum on Monday and Terry noted that while their defensive efforts have improved recently, their offensive production has dwindled simultaneously.
“I think we’re defending better,” Terry said. “The last couple of games, we just haven’t been scoring at the clip that we were to start the year. It’s not like I didn’t think we were doing right things to score, we just weren’t finishing. Defensively, we’re starting to shore things up and continuing to learn how to manage those games.”
“You lose three in a row, you come back home, and you have a little homestand. You want to get back right away on the winning track,” Nesterenko said. “ You don’t want to keep the losing streak going into the homestand, because those could pile up quick. So it’s nice to get back in the winning column. Just playing fast and keeping that relentless pressure throughout the whole game, that’s what we’ve been good at. Hopefully, we can do it again tonight.”
“I think that we can be better in that area (starting the game strong) as well,” Quenneville said. “Our game last game was fine at the start, but I don’t think we want to expect the pace to pick up as we go along here. Let’s try to initiate it and dictate it.”
The Bruins will be without defenseman Charlie McAvoy, who took a puck to the face on Nov. 15 and did not travel with the Bruins for their four-game road trip. They will also be without Viktor Arvidsson (lower-body), who was placed on injured reserve on Monday. Elias Lindholm and Casey Mittelstadt complete the quad of impact players for the Bruins who are currently out with long-term injuries. Both players are also on injured reserve, though Lindholm traveled with the team and participated in morning skate.
Granlund (lower-body) and Ryan Poehling (upper-body) remain out for the Ducks. They did not participate in Tuesday’s optional practice and are considered day-to-day.
Ducks Projected Lines
Chris Kreider – Leo Carlsson – Troy Terry
Cutter Gauthier – Mason McTavish – Beckett Sennecke
Frank Vatrano – Ryan Strome – Alex Killorn
Ross Johnston – Jansen Harkins – Nikita Nesterenko
Jackson LaCombe – Drew Helleson
Olen Zellweger – Jacob Trouba
Ian Moore – Radko Gudas
Lukáš Dostál (confirmed)
Bruins Projected Lines
Morgan Geekie – Marat Khusnutdinov – David Pastrňák
Alex Steeves – Pavel Zacha – Matěj Blümel
Tanner Jeannot – Fraser Minten – Mark Kastelic
Jeffrey Viel – Sean Kuraly – Mikey Eyssimont
Nikita Zadorov – Jonathan Aspirot
Hampus Lindholm – Henri Jokiharju
Mason Lohrei – Andrew Peeke
Joonas Korpisalo (confirmed)
