Berkshire Bank Faceoff: Projected Lines, Pairings For Bruins-Hurricanes

The Boston Bruins will aim for back-to-back wins for the first time since March 12 and March 14 when they take on the Carolina Hurricanes on Sunday night.

Boston has a 1-point lead over the Ottawa Senators for the second wild-card playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. Ottawa, which also has a game in hand on Boston, plays the Florida Panthers on Sunday night.

Tuukka Rask will start in net for the Bruins, per Dave Goucher of 98.5 The Sports Hub. Rask left Saturday’s game against the New York Rangers early in the second period because of dehydration symptoms, but head coach Claude Julien said Rask was fine after the game.

The reigning Vezina Trophy winner is 5-3-1 with a 2.09 goals against average and a .933 save percentage versus Carolina in his career.

The Hurricanes will go with former Bruin Anton Khudobin in net. He made 19 saves on 20 shots in Carolina’s 2-1 shootout win over Boston on Jan. 4.

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Here are the projected lineups for both teams:

BOSTON BRUINS (37-25-13, fourth in Atlantic)
Brad Marchand-Patrice Bergeron-David Krejci
Milan Lucic-Ryan Spooner-David Pastrnak
Loui Eriksson-Carl Soderberg-Reilly Smith
Chris Kelly-Gregory Campbell-Max Talbot

Zdeno Chara-Adam McQuaid
Torey Krug-Dennis Seidenberg
Matt Bartkowski-Zach Trotman

Tuukka Rask

CAROLINA HURRICANES (28-36-10, eighth in Metropolitan)
Eric Staal-Jordan Staal-Elias Lindholm
Jeff Skinner-Victor Rask-Chris Terry
Nathan Gerbe-Riley Nash-Alexander Semin
Andrej Nestrasil-Jay McClement-Patrick Dwyer

Justin Faulk-Ron Hainsey
John-Michael Liles-Brett Bellemore
Danny Biega-Ryan Murphy

Anton Khudobin