Toronto Maple Leafs @ Boston Bruins
Thursday, Dec 18,2008 7:00 PM EST

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Boston Bruins (21-5-4, 46pts)
1st Northeast, 1st Eastern Conference

Many people are surprised with Bruins good results in this season. But I'm not!

Over a year ago when I saw the news that they installed Claude Julien as head coach I knew that Boston will improve a lot.

All teams coached by Julien made big improvements in defence we've seen this with Montreal, New Jersey and now Boston. With only 63 goals alowed and 2.06 GAA Boston has best defence in league.

But I’m also impresed with their attack. Kessel, Krejci, Lucic, Wheeler and Bergeron are 5 young forwards who are playing excellent this season.

Boston has been superb in TD Banknorth Garden with 11-1-1. And guess what team won in regulation in Boston? Toronto.

That game was played on Oct 24th, Boston started the game well got early lead 2-0 in 1st period and than Toronto scored 4 goals in last two periods to win 4-2.

Medical Watch :
• C Patrice Bergeron missed Saturday night’s game with the flu.
• LW Marco Sturm missed his 12th straight game because of a head/neck injury and was placed on long-term injured reserve dating to Nov. 17. He is eligible to play Thursday night, and there’s still no way of knowing if he will.
• F Petteri Nokelainen was out with an upper body injury.
• D Aaron Ward who returned briefly Friday night and went down with the same leg injury, was out again.
• D Andrew Ference missed his 14th game because of a fractured tibia.

I expect only Bergeron back in lineup.

Toronto Maple Leafs (12-12-6, 30pts)
4th Northeast, 11th Eastern Conference

This is a rebuilding season for Toronto.

No more big old names: Darcy Tucker, Andrew Raycroft, Kyle Wellwood, Bryan McCabe ... and no more Mats Sundin. After 13 seasons, 981 games played (420 G,567A) Sundin is no longer playing for Toronto Maple Leafs.

Good old Mats will be back soon,probably in Vancouver or NY Rangers jersey, but now he is trying to play poker on PokerStars.

Toronto goes into Thursday’s road game against the Boston Bruins with season-high three-game winning streak (W 4-2 vs NY Islanders, W 2-1 @ Buffalo and W 3-2 OT vs New Jersey) with good play in defence and excellent goaltending from Vesa Toskala (1.67 GAA and .937 SV% in that 3 games).

But Toskala was in the goal for the 9th straight game and I expect backup Curtis Joseph to start tonight.

Medical Watch :
• D Luke Schenn (knee) will be out two to three weeks.
• D Jonas Frogren (hyperextended elbow/bicep) is day to day.
• RW Jamal Mayers (broken hand) is out two weeks.
• LW Niklas Hagman (concussion) is day-to-day.

Head to Head this season:

18.11.2008 Toronto-Boston 2:3
07.11.2008 Boston-Toronto 5:2
24.10.2008 Boston-Toronto 2:4

THe VERDICT

I expect the same scenario as in all 3 games this season. Boston to start hard, score first and their defence to dominate.

FIXED ODDS BETTING :

My pick is Boston to win in regulation