Bergeron remains sidelined as Bruins begin road trip against Avalanche

DENVER – The Bruins again will be without the services of Patrice Bergeron (lower-body injury) tonight when they face the Colorado Avalanche at Pepsi Center.

He did travel with the team and skated on his own this afternoon. There’s a possibility he could return to the lineup this weekend when the Bruins play the Coyotes on Saturday and the Golden Knights on Sunday.



The Bruins have a day off in Phoenix on Thursday, but Bergeron is expected to skate.

“We see how he reacts to being on the ice today,” Bruce Cassidy said.

Boston’s top-line center hasn’t played a game this season. Bergeron had surgery during the offseason to repair a sports hernia, but the team has said his current injury is not related.

Tuukka Rask will start against the Avalanche, and Cassidy said backup Anton Khudobin will play one game this weekend, but it hasn’t been determined whether he’ll play against the Coyotes or Golden Knights.

Torey Krug understandably had a little bit of rust in his first game back during Monday’s 4-0 loss to the Avalanche at TD Garden. He missed three weeks with a broken jaw and was fighting the puck a bit against Colorado. Cassidy doesn’t think it will take Krug long to find his game.

“He’s a skilled guy, so the more he can handle the puck, and the puck finds him, and we get on power plays, I think his game will come back faster,” Cassidy said. “Those guys that like to handle the puck, they get more excited when they’re given opportunities to do that and their games come around quicker. Let’s hope there are some opportunities for him. He’s been in the league a long time, so I anticipate it won’t take him long. Hopefully on this trip he gets his legs under him and back to the player that we need him to be.”

He’s still sporting the protective guard on his face mask.

Here are the projected line combinations and defensive pairings for tonight:

Forwards

Marchand-Nash-Pastrnak

DeBrusk-Krejci-Bjork

Beleskey-Spooner-Vatrano

Schaller-Kuraly-Heinen

Defense

Chara-Carlo

Krug-McQuaid

Miller-McAvoy

Goalies

Rask

Khudobin