Michael Eyssimont stays on the Bruins' Minten-Geekie line at Thursday's morning skate, with Montreal in town tonight.
Belle Fraser and Jim McBride both posted the lines this morning, and the group looks set for the Homecoming game against the Canadiens. They are morning-skate lines, so they can still change before puck drop.
Fraser noted that Quebec native Frederic Brunet led the group onto the ice for the stretch ahead of his first NHL matchup against the Canadiens.
Eyssimont is the story up front. He scored the winner in his first game back on Nov 8, and the staff has now kept him next to Fraser Minten and Morgan Geekie for a second straight day, as we saw in Michael Eyssimont's move next to Minten and Geekie.
The top line is untouched, with Pastrnak on the right of Peterka and Pavel Zacha. Sean Kuraly is the extra forward, so Tanner Jeannot, Matthew Poitras and Mark Kastelic hold the fourth line.
Nobody is rushing to fix what isn't broken. Boston has won four straight, and Marco Sturm has no reason to shuffle a group that is doing this.
The standings give the game real weight. The Bruins are first in the Atlantic at 13-4-1 with 27 points, and Montreal sits third with 26, one point back.
Is Frederic Brunet ready for his first game against the Canadiens?
He looks ready. Brunet has 5 points in 12 games this season and a +5 rating, and he's skating on the third pair next to Mason Lohrei.
He's also from the Gatineau area, which makes this a different kind of night. A 2022 fifth-round pick in his first season as a regular, he'll face the team he grew up watching.
The blue line around him is settled. Hampus Lindholm and Charlie McAvoy anchor the top pair, Nikita Zadorov and William Borgen follow, and Jonathan Aspirot and Connor Clifton round out the group.
The crease is the open question. Both Jeremy Swayman and Michael DiPietro appear in the skate posts, and the starter has not been confirmed.
Montreal arrives off a 2-1 overtime loss to Minnesota on Tuesday. The Bruins' lines and the confirmed starter should be clear closer to puck drop tonight.
This article was written with the help of artificial intelligence, based on public reports and official sources.
Should Marco Sturm start Jeremy Swayman against the Canadiens tonight?
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