The Bruins may be down another defenseman when they take on the Vegas Golden Knights for the second end of a back-to-back, and their third game in the last four days.
Brandon Carlo is questionable for Sunday night’s game vs. Vegas at TD Garden with an upper body injury suffered in Saturday night’s 5-1 win over the Maple Leafs, and Jeremy Lauzon has been called back up from Providence to potentially play in his place.
It’s certainly a loss. Carlo has averaged 20:58 of ice time per game in the 16 games to start this season for the Bruins, and has been the top pairing shutdown guy along with Zdeno Chara since Charlie McAvoy went down with a concussion.
Bruins head coach Bruce Cassidy indicated on Sunday morning that Carlo “probably won’t play”, so Lauzon should be expecting to get the call after being sent back down to Providence last week. Lauzon played four games for the Bruins during his first stint, with the team while averaging 12:01 of ice time per game while being used pretty sparingly as a bottom-pairing defenseman.
Still, Lauzon also wasn’t a minus player during his four games with the Bruins and stayed away from the big mistakes that can sometimes plague a young D-man in his first go-through at the NHL level. Lauzon should be the only change for the Bruins, as Noel Acciari is expected to be the healthy scratch for the second game in a row, and Jaroslav Halak will start the second half of the back-to-back after picking up the win on Saturday.
Cassidy also hinted that Tuukka Rask may rejoin the Bruins on Tuesday after taking a leave of absence through the weekend.
Here are the projected line combos and D-pairings for Sunday night’s game vs. the Golden Knights:
Boston Bruins
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Marchand-Bergeron-Pastrnak
Nordstrom-Krejci-DeBrusk
Heinen-JFK-Bjork
Wagner-Kuraly-Backes
Chara-Grzelcyk
Krug-Moore
Lauzon-Kampfer
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