Madison Square Garden has been the home to many of the all-time classics in this sport. It’s the only unsponsored arena remaining in the NHL and tonight it will see two of the original six clashes in a game that is sure to provide fireworks. It’s a typical Boston vs New York rivalry as the Boston Bruins are in town to take on the New York Rangers. This game is going to be one you do not want to miss.
For the Rangers, they have won their last three in a row correcting an early season skid. Wins over Dallas, Arizona, and Philadelphia have reestablished the Rangers’ confidence. Just behind the division-leading New Jersey Devils on points percentage, this game could see the Rangers return to the top of the Metropolitan Division once again as they hunt their fourth consecutive win.
Nothing in the NHL comes easily and that will hold true again tonight with this opponent. I mentioned the Rangers reestablishing their confidence but this is a Bruins team that seems to take the Hydra approach. You cut off its head once and three more sprout up. Boston is 9-1-0 on the season with a league-leading 18 points. No team is easy to beat in the NHL, but this looks like the biggest hurdle the Rangers have faced yet.
New York is expected to be without Vitali Kravtsov yet again as he will miss his third straight game after a big hit in the American Airlines Center in Dallas. Listed as an upper-body injury, he is ruled out for tonight. However, someone that isn’t ruled out tonight is Filip Chytil. Gerard Gallant has said it is possible he returns tonight, but there is no confirmation as of yet.
Igor Shesterkin is expected to go again for the Rangers as the reigning Vezina winner has been excellent yet again. For the Bruins, Jeremy Swayman has been ruled out with a lower-body injury so it is going to be Linus Ullmark again. With the Swedish shot-stopper off to a hot start to the season, the Rangers forwards will have a difficult job on their hands trying to get the puck past him.
Boston Bruins
Brad Marchand – Patrice Bergeron – Jake DeBrusk
Taylor Hall – Pavel Zacha – David Pastrnak
Trent Frederic – Charlie Coyle – A.J. Greer
Nick Foligno – Tomas Nosek – Jakub Lauko
Connor Clifton – Hampus Lindholm
Matt Grzelcyk – Brandon Carlo
Mike Reilly – Anton Stralman
Linus Ullmark
Keith Kinkaid
New York Rangers
Chris Kreider – Mika Zibanejad – Kaapo Kakko
Artemi Panarin – Vincent Trocheck – Alexis Lafreniere
Jimmy Vesey – Barclay Goodrow – Julien Gauthier
Sammy Blais – Ryan Carpenter – Ryan Reaves
Ryan Lindgren – Adam Fox
K’Andre Miller – Jacob Trouba
Zac Jones – Braden Schneider
Igor Shesterkin
Jaroslav Halak
This game starts at 7:30 PM Eastern. It will be available on ESPN+ and Hulu. New York will look to push its winning streak to 4 games. Boston will be trying to make its winning streak 7. One of these teams will lose tonight. One of these teams will continue to heat up as we start to get into the meet of the season here. As we approach Thanksgiving, this is a game that the Rangers could win to remove all doubt in them.