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The New York Islanders welcome the Boston Bruins to the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum for the first time this season, although it is the second time they will have faced each other.

The Bruins beat the Islanders on November 7th in Boston 6-2. Since then, the Bruins come in as winners of seven in a row. The Islanders are 2-5-3 in their last 10 games and are coming off a win against the Montreal Canadiens this part Thursday night.

The Islanders honor their first captain, Ed Westfall tonight. There will be a ceremony in his honor, and he will also get to broadcast the second period of the game with his former broadcast partner Jiggs McDonald.

Last game against the Canadiens, Islanders goalie Evgeni Nabakov injured his groin and is no out indefinitely. four games ago, Al Montoya strained his hamstring against the Avalanche. This leaves Rick DiPietro as the only healthy Islanders goalie. His backup will be Swedish goalie Anders Nilsson who was called up from Bridgeport of the AHL.

DiPietro has a goals-against average of 2.86 and a save-percentage of .900.

Mike Mottau is a healthy scratch for the Islanders after his two mistakes on Thursday led to two of the three Canadiens goals. Mark Eaton steps back into the lineup in his place after being scratched for the last two games. Kyle Okposo will be a healthy scratch for the third game in a row.

Islanders Lines:

Moulson-Tavares-Grabner

Rolston-Nielsen-Parenteau

Comeau-Reasoner-Niederreiter

Martin-Bailey-Pandolfo

Streit-Staios

MacDonald-Hamonic

Eaton-Jurcina

DiPietro

Nilsson

Bruins coach Claude Julien said the lineup for tonight would be "the same as last time," and he also said that Johnny Boychuk is a gametime decision. He missed their last game against the Columbus Blue Jackets because of flu-like symptoms.

It is unclear at this point whether Tim Thomas or Tuukka Rask will start in goal. Rask played against Columbus on Thursday night.

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