Morning skate: Lydman in, Roy and Connolly OK
Lots of questions and only some are forthcoming at the morning skate for tonight's Sabres-Bruins game. Lindy Ruff said Thursday was a "maintenance" day for Derek Roy and Tim Connolly and didn't seem to think they would be out tonight, so we'll see if there's any news on that front when the Sabres hit the ice at 10 and meet the media afterwards.
UPDATE: Roy and Connolly are both on the ice in their regular spots. The lines are MacArthur-Roy-Pominville, Vanek-Connolly-Stafford, Hecht-Kennedy-Kaleta, Ellis-Gaustad-Mair. Mike Grier is also out skating lightly.
UPDATE II: Toni Lydman will be back in the the lineup, skating with Steve Montador. Andrej Sekera and Nathan Paetsch are the scratches on defense.
The bigger question surrounds the Bruins. They won in a shootout last night in Atlanta and are not expected to skate here this morning after making the late-night charter flight. So we may not find out until pregame warmups if Tim Thomas will be in goal or if Tuukka Rask will make this third straight start. Thomas is out with coach Claude Julien last night called a "minor undisclosed injury." Yeah, thanks for nothing there, Coach.
Marc Savard is expected to stay out one more game due to the broken foot that has kept him out the last 14. He's likely to play Monday in St. Louis. Savard, by the way, is on the verge of signing a seven-year contract extension that's in the $32 million range. Rugged winger Milan Lucic (finger) returned last night after missing 14 games but was hardly himself with just one hit in 14 minutes. Ex-Sabre Daniel Paille has two goals and four assists in 14 games since his trade to Boston last month.
---Mike Harrington
