rangers bruins

The Rangers are home tonight to take on the Bruins in their preseason finale. With at least two cuts looming, all four guys on the bubble are in the lineup looking to prove they belong. Ice time will paint a picture for us tonight, and a few Rangers from last year may find themselves on the wrong side of the ax.

As for the Bruins, well they had a weird offseason. I really don’t know how else to summarize it. Don Sweeney is either a genius or a fool, and there’s really no middle ground here. They aren’t dressing an NHL lineup tonight, but that’s what happens when both Zdeno Chara and Dennis Seidenberg are hurt.

What have they done lately?

The Bruins are a weird, weird team. They have skill, they have solid goaltending, and they have one of the best players in the game in Patrice Bergeron. But aside from that, they have very little else. Their defense and depth are questionable at best. Even odder is that after a summer of no cap space, they have $8 million in cap space as of today. I don’t get it.

Bruins Systems

The Bruins have had the same style of play for years under Claude Julien. They play an aggressive 2-1-2 forecheck early in the period and then switch to a more conservative 1-4 or 1-1-3 lock later in the period if they have a lead. In the defensive zone, the Bs play a low zone collapse and try to defend you in layers depending on puck location. On special teams, the Bruins use an umbrella power play and a wedge+1/diamond force penalty kill where they try to pressure for turnovers.

Bruins Lines

Jimmy Hayes-Ryan Spooner-Brett Connolly
Anton Blidh-Joonas Kemppainen-Max Talbot
Zac Rinaldo-Ben Sexton-Tyler Randell
Brandon DeFazio-Alex Khokhlachev-Brian Ferlin

Matt Irwin-Adam McQuaid
Chris Breen-Zach Trotman
Tommy Cross-Colin Miller

Jonas Gustavsson/Jeremy Smith

Rangers Lines

Forwards: J.T. Miller, Kevin Hayes, Tanner Glass, Derick Brassard, Chris Kreider, Derek Stepan, Oscar Lindberg, Viktor Stalberg, Jarret Stoll, Mats Zuccarello, Rick Nash,Emerson Etem

Defense: Dan Girardi, Dylan McIlrath, Kevin Klein, Marc Staal, Raphael Diaz, Ryan McDonagh

Goalies: Henrik Lundqvist, Antti Raanta

Be sure to check out our ticket link if you’re looking for tickets to the game. Game time is 7pm on MSG.

Share: 

More About: