Connor Clifton is back, but it’s at the expense of a couple other blueliners.
The second-year defenseman will play in his first game since Dec. 29 when the Boston Bruins visit the Philadelphia Flyers on Tuesday in a matchup of teams that might face each other in the first round of the NHL playoffs. Clifton has been out with an upper-body injury, but was activated from IR on Saturday.
With Brandon Carlo and Torey Krug both dealing with upper-body ailments that will force them to miss Tuesday’s game, John Moore also will stay in the lineup, so he and Clifton will make up the third pairing. As a result, Matt Grzelcyk and Jeremy Lauzon will bump up to become the second pairing.
Anders Bjork will continue to be a healthy scratch, so the third line will consist of Sean Kuraly and Jake DeBrusk on the wings with Charlie Coyle between them. Joakim Nordstrom, Par Lindholm and Chris Wagner will be Boston’s fourth liners.
Tuukka Rask will be in net for the Bruins and will be opposed by Carter Hart.
Here are the projected lineups for Bruins-Flyers.
BOSTON BRUINS (43-14-12)
Brad Marchand–Patrice Bergeron–David Pastrnak
Nick Ritchie–David Krejci–Ondrej Kase
Sean Kuraly–Charlie Coyle–Jake DeBrusk
Joakim Nordstrom–Par Lindholm–Chris Wagner
Zdeno Chara–Charlie McAvoy
Matt Grzelcyk–Jeremy Lauzon
John Moore–Connor Clifton
Tuukka Rask
PHILADELPHIA FLYERS (41-20-7)
Claude Giroux–Sean Couturier-_Jakub Voracek
Joel Farabee–Kevin Hayes–Travis Konecny
Scott Laughton–Derek Grant–Tyler Pitlick
Michael Raffl–Nate Thompson–Nicolas Aube-Kubel
Ivan Provorov–Matt Niskanen
Travis Sanheim–Shayne Gostisbehere
Robert Hagg–Justin Braun
Carter Hart