Bruins at Coyotes
The Arizona Coyotes have emerged as a playoff contender near the quarter mark of the regular season with their work on defense and while short-handed as they try to end a 12-game losing streak against the visiting Boston Bruins on Saturday. The Coyotes entered Friday leading the NHL in penalty-killing and ranked third in scoring among defensemen while their 10 short-handed goals were six more than any other team in the league.
Michael Grabner has scored a league-leading four short-handed goals to lead the penalty-killing unit for Arizona, which has joined the hunt in the Pacific Division despite being 28th in the league in scoring. “He’s a veteran and he’s very smart,” Coyotes coach Rick Tocchet told reporters of Grabner. “There are pressure points on a power play, and as a penalty-killer, he knows where to go and when the pressure is being played. That’s just his experience over the years. That’s why he’s been such a good penalty-killer.” The Coyotes will face one of the best power plays in the league Saturday, but the Bruins are short-handed on the blue line as injuries took five of their top seven defensemen out of the lineup for Friday's 1-0 overtime loss at Dallas. Captain Zdeno Chara (leg), Charlie McAvoy (concussion), Kevan Miller (hand), John Moore (lower body) and Brandon Carlo (upper body) all are unlikely to return for Boston on Saturday.
TV: 8 p.m. ET, NESN (Boston), FS Arizona Plus
ABOUT THE BRUINS (10-6-3): Connor Clifton played 18 minutes, 53 seconds and Jakub Zboril saw 10:53 of action in their NHL debuts on the blue line for Boston while defenseman Jeremy Lauzon logged 24:52 of ice time in his seventh career contest on Friday. Tuukka Rask made 36 saves to secure the point for the Bruins, who successfully killed four penalties against Dallas but fell to 0-1-1 on their four-game road trip that concludes Wednesday in Detroit. Patrice Bergeron leads the team with 17 assists and 26 points - one better than David Pastrnak, who has scored a league-leading 17 goals but was blanked Friday after tallying five times and recording eight points in his previous three games.
ABOUT THE COYOTES (9-8-1): Darcy Kuemper, playing in place of the injured Antti Raanta (lower body), made 45 saves in a 2-1 victory over Nashville on Thursday after a rough outing against Detroit two days earlier. “Sometimes it’s nice seeing a lot of (shots), it’s easier to get in a rhythm,” Kuemper, who stopped just 12-of-17 shots on Tuesday, told reporters. “I felt good, and the guys were doing a great job in front of me, boxing out and letting me see everything.” Jason Demers suffered a lower-body injury Thursday while the status of fellow defensemen Alex Goligoski (lower body) and Jakob Chychrun (upper body) is uncertain.
OVERTIME
1. Boston came up empty in two tries on the power play Friday but is 9-for-24 over its last six games.
2. Arizona C Clayton Keller shares the team lead in points (12) with D Oliver Ekman-Larsson but has gone without a goal in eight games.
3. Bruins RW David Backes notched an assist Tuesday for his first point of the season and has registered only 19 shots in 14 games.