PITTSBURGH -- The Ottawa Senators wind up a six-game road trip when they take on the Pittsburgh Penguins on Friday night -- a successful journey to date in which they have gone 3-1-1. The road swing took on a slightly different twist when they spent three full days at home following a 2-1 overtime loss Sunday at Vancouver.
 
After they return home to play Carolina on Sunday, it's back on the road to play the Winnipeg Jets, Dallas Stars and Washington Capitals.
 
"The last game in Vancouver was against an elite team, and again here in Pittsburgh it's an elite team," coach Paul MacLean said. "We're measuring ourselves against some of the best teams in the League. We've had some success and we've had some nights that haven't been very successful. So this is another opportunity for us to come in here and be prepared to play the game the Senators' way and see how it goes. But we're looking forward to the opportunity."
 
MacLean isn't displeased that his team is playing nine of 10 on the road.
 
"The mix of old and young we have -- we were home quite a bit (earlier) -- these long road trips at this time of the year allow you to bond as a group," MacLean said. "Just have the fellows go out and do some things. We've been home now for four days coming back from Vancouver, and we thought the trip out west was a good opportunity for us to show the people in Canada what kind of a team we have and for our team to go together. I believe that we did a good job on both sides of that."
 
MacLean said there would be no lineup changes for the Penguins, who took three of four in the 2010-11 season series after eliminating Ottawa in the Eastern Conference Quarterfinals the previous season.
 
The Senators' lines:

Colin Greening - Jason Spezza - Milan Michalek
Nick Foligno - Stephane Da Costa - Daniel Alfredsson
Kaspars Daugavins - Zack Smith - Erik Condra
Zenon Konopka - Jesse Winchester - Bobby Butler
 
Erik Karlsson - Filip Kuba
Sergei Gonchar - Chris Phillips
Brian Lee - Jared Cowen
 
Craig Anderson will be in goal, with Alex Auld as the backup. Anderson's career record against Pittsburgh is 2-1-1 with a 1.99 goals-against average and a .935 save percentage. Auld is 5-1 against the Penguins.

BOSTON – The Bruins will put their 10-game winning streak on the line today against Detroit with Tuukka Rask in goal at TD Garden.
   
Jimmy Howard will start for Detroit, which has won three in a row.
   
The Bruins will also be looking to avenge a home-and-home sweep by the Red Wings in February.

Here is the Bruins’ projected lineup based on pre-game warm-ups:

Milan Lucic - David Krejci - Nathan Horton
Brad Marchand - Patrice Bergeron - Tyler Seguin
Benoit Pouliot - Chris Kelly - Rich Peverley
Daniel Paille - Gregory Campbell - Shawn Thornton

Zdeno Chara - Johnny Boychuk
Dennis Seidenberg - Joe Corvo
Andrew Ference - Adam McQuaid

Here is the Red Wings’ lineup based on pre-game warm-ups:

Johan Franzen - Pavel Datsyuk - Todd Bertuzzi
Valtteri Filppula - Henrik Zetterberg - Danny Cleary
Jiri Hudler - Darren Helm - Justin Abdelkader
Drew Miller - Cory Emmerton - Tomas Holmstrom

Jonathan Ericsson - Niklas Kronwall
Nicklas Lidstrom - Ian White
Jakub Kindl - Brad Stuart

Detroit outscored Boston, 10-3, last season in those two February meetings.

These are how the lines could look when the Dallas Stars face the Toronto Maple Leafs tonight at the American Airlines Center:

MAPLE LEAFS
Joffrey Lupul - Tyler Bozak - Phil Kessel
Clarke MacArthur - Tim Connolly - Nikolai Kulemin
Matt Frattin - Joe Colborne - Joey Crabb
Jay Rosehill - David Steckel - Philippe Dupuis

Carl Gunnarsson - Dion Phaneuf
John-Michael Liles - Cody Franson
Jake Gardiner - Luke Schenn

Jonas Gustavsson
Ben Scrivens

STARS
Loui Eriksson - Jamie Benn - Michael Ryder
Steve Ott - Mike Ribeiro - Tomas Vincour
Eric Nystrom - Vernon Fiddler - Radek Dvorak
Jake Dowell - Tom Wandell - Toby Petersen

Stephane Robidas - Sheldon Souray
Trevor Daley - Nicklas Grossman
Mark Fistric- Philip Larsen

Kari Lehtonen
Andrew Raycroft

RALEIGH, N.C. -- After 13 consecutive starts by Ondrej Pavelec in goal, the Jets will turn to backup Chris Mason Friday night against Carolina. Mason earned his only win of the season against the Hurricanes Oct. 22, coming in in relief to stop 18 of 19 shots.

"We just need to rest Pavelec," coach Claude Noel said. "Mason is really a fierce competitor. We had to get him back playing. For us, it's getting him to be part of the team. He's one of the leaders in our room."

Mason, who has appeared in four games, knows the keys to returning to the lineup after a layoff.

"I want to focus on controlling rebounds and covering pucks when I can, slow it down a bit," he said. "Those are the biggest things when you haven't played in a while. You can simulate those situations (in practice) but when you have three or four guys crashing the net and a big pile of guys around, that's the hardest part for me."

The Hurricanes will be without defenseman Jay Harrison, who is day-to-day with an upper-body injury. He will be replaced by Derek Joslin.

JETS
Andrew Ladd - Nik Antropov - Kyle Wellwood
Evander Kane - Bryan Little - Blake Wheeler
Tanner Glass - Jim Slater - Alexander Burmistrov
Chris Thorburn - Tim Stapleton - Eric Fehr
 
Dustin Byfuglien - Mark Stuart
Ron Hainsey - Zach Bogosian
Johnny Oduya - Mark Flood
 
Chris Mason

HURRICANES
Jeff Skinner -  Eric Staal - Tuomo Ruutu
Alexei Ponikarovsky - Jussi Jokinen - Chad LaRose
Jiri Tlusty - Brandon Sutter - Patrick Dwyer
Anthony Stewart - Tim Brent - Brett Sutter
 
Tim Gleason - Bryan Allen
Justin Faulk - Derek Joslin
Jamie McBain - Tomas Kaberle
  
Cam Ward

PITTSBURGH -- One more statistic from Sidney Crosby's comeback game on Monday: 14,000.
 
Those were the number of votes the Pittsburgh Penguins captain received that day alone as part of the NHL All-Star Fan Balloting. Even though he has played just two games this season, Crosby already is 10th in the balloting among forwards for the 2012 Tim Hortons All-Star Game in Ottawa.
 
Crosby has led all vote-getters during each of the last four All-Star Games (2007, 2008, 2009 and 2011).
 
Crosby had a four-point game Monday against the Islanders as he returned from a 10-month layoff with a concussion. He was held without a point during a 3-2 overtime loss to St. Louis on Wednesday.

Crosby will remain on a line with Chris Kunitz and Pascal Dupuis when the Penguins wrap up a three-game homestand by playing the Ottawa Senators at Consol Energy Center on Friday night.
 
The Penguins' lines:
 
Chris Kunitz - Sidney Crosby - Pascal Dupuis
Steve Sullivan - Evgeni Malkin - James Neal
Matt Cooke - Jordan Staal - Tyler Kennedy
Arron Asham - Richard Park - Craig Adams
 
Paul Martin - Zbynek Michalek
Brooks Orpik - Kris Letang
Matt Niskanen - Deryk Engelland
 
Marc-Andre Fleury will be in goal as the Penguins play the front end of back-to-back weekend games. Fleury is 6-8-1 with a 3.63 goals-against average in his career against Ottawa, while backup Brent Johnson is 8-1-1 with a 1.99 goals-against average against the Senators. Coach Dan Bylsma, who has not revealed his goalie choice for Saturday night’s game at Montreal, said records aren't the only factor in choosing a goalie.
 

SUNRISE, Fla. — Anton Stralman will make his New York Rangers debut Wednesday night against the Florida Panthers.

The 25-year-old Swedish defenseman has been a healthy scratch since signing with the Rangers on Nov. 5. Coach John Tortorella is hoping Stralman can help a power play that is tied for 28th in the League.

"He needs to get in sooner or later, see what he is," Tortorella said. "I thought he moved the puck well on our power play yesterday (at practice). We'll see if he can help us a little bit there."

Tortorella said Jeff Woywitka will be scratched to make room for Stralman.

Stralman spent the last two seasons with Columbus. He led all Blue Jackets defensemen with 34 points two seasons ago and had 18 points in 51 games in 2010-11.

DENVER – Semyon Varlamov will be back in goal for the Colorado Avalanche and Cory Schneider will remain in goal for the Vancouver Canucks tonight when the teams meet at Pepsi Center.

Varlamov, who is in a 0-5-1 slump, will make his first start since Nov. 15 when he faced 33 shots in the Avalanche’s 6-3 loss in Pittsburgh. He hasn’t won since Oct. 30, a 3-2 home win against Los Angeles, and served as the backup to Jean-Sebastien Giguere for the past three games.

Schneider will make his third start in a row as Roberto Luongo recovers from the upper-body injury he suffered Nov. 13 in the Canucks’ 4-1 win against the New York Islanders. Luongo took part in the optional pregame skate this morning and is expected to start Friday against Phoenix in the second game of the Canucks’ three-game road trip.

Schneider is coming off a 28-save performance Sunday in the Canucks’ 2-1 overtime victory over the Ottawa Senators. He’s posted a 3-4-0 record with a 2.52 goals-against average and .912 save percentage.

Defenseman Keith Ballard (back spasms) and left wing Mason Raymond (vertebrae compression fracture) are close to returning, but they won’t play against Colorado.

After getting off to a hot start, Varlamov has allowed 20 goals during his six-game winless streak. He permitted seven goals in one game, six in another and was replaced by Giguere early in the second period of a 5-2 loss in Detroit on Nov. 8 after giving up three goals on 16 shots.

The Canucks have dominated the Avalanche in recent games, posting a 5-0-1 record against them last season and a 6-1-2 mark in the past nine games in Denver.

“They have a lot of high-end skill and they’re tough on the back end and they have good goaltending,” Avalanche center Paul Stastny said this morning. “They have depth everywhere and they’re a good special-teams team.”

The Canucks are especially potent on the power play. They lead the NHL with a 26.7 percent success rate and have connected for 10 goals on 24 man advantages (41.7 percent) in the past seven games.

The Avalanche has the second-best power play (25.7 percent) but probably will be without defenseman Erik Johnson, who is nursing a groin ailment, to play the point.

Colorado has lost four of the past five games overall and seven of 10 home games this season.

“I don’t think we’re playing as bad as our record indicates,” defenseman Shane O’Brien said. “At the same time, our record is what our record is. We still have six games left on this homestand, which is huge for us. We have a lot of hard work ahead of us. You don’t want to make excuses, but the hockey gods maybe haven’t been on our side; we’ve had some bad bounces. But at the same time, you create your own bounces with hard work.”

DENVER -- These are the projected lineups for tonight's game between the Vancouver Canucks and Colorado Avalanche at Pepsi Center:

CANUCKS

Daniel Sedin - Henrik Sedin - Alexandre Burrows
David Booth - Ryan Kesler - Chris Higgins
Manny Malhotra - Cody Hodgson - Jannik Hansen
Aaron Volpatti - Maxim Lapierre - Dale Weise

Kevin Bieksa - Dan Hamhuis
Alexander Edler - Sami Salo
Andrew Alberts - Aaron Rome

Cory Schneider will start in goal with Roberto Luongo as the backup.

AVALANCHE

Gabriel Landeskog - Matt Duchene - Milan Hejduk
Joakim Lindstrom - Paul Stastny - Chuck Kobasew
David Jones - Ryan O'Reilly - Daniel Winnik
TJ Galiardi - Jay McClement - Kevin Porter

Kyle Quincey - Shane O'Brien
Jan Hejda - Matt Hunwick
Ryan Wilson - Ryan O'Byrne

Semyon Varlamov will start in goal with Jean-Sebastien Giguere as the backup.

SUNRISE, Fla. -- Panthers center Marcel Goc will miss his fourth consecutive game Wednesday night with what has been listed as an upper-body injury, and he might be out for a little while longer.

Coach Kevin Dineen addressed Goc's status after the Panthers' optional morning skate and said the injury was a result of Goc taking a hit to the head in a game at Dallas Nov. 15.

Dineen, however, stopped short of calling the injury a concussion.

"We're just in that precautionary stage before we make any kind of statement on exactly what the injury is," he said. "I had a really good talk with him today and he’s making strides in the right direction.

"He took a pretty good shot. I don't like playing this game where I'm trying to stickhandle around what exactly an injury is, but sometimes I have to get a definitive answer from my medical group before I make any kind of a public statement on that."

Goc, signed as a free agent from Nashville on July 1, has 2 goals in 17 games, but has been a key member of the penalty-killing unit and also has been asked to take a lot of key faceoffs in the defensive zone.

Dineen did not give a timetable for Goc’s return.

"Everybody has different reactions to injuries and his are consistent with us giving us some time to make sure that he's all right," Dineen said.

SUNRISE, Fla. -- Florida's top line of Stephen Weiss, Kris Versteeg and Tomas Fleischmann has produced big numbers all season, but now the Panthers are looking for more offensive contributions from their other lines.

That's why there might be different line combinations Wednesday night when the Panthers face the New York Rangers.

In the Panthers' last two games -- 3-2 and 4-3 victories over Pittsburgh and New Jersey, respectively -- the top line accounted for six of the seven goals. The other was scored by defenseman Brian Campbell on a feed from Versteeg.

Versteeg (11), Fleischmann (9) and Weiss (8) have combined for 28 goals on the season, but no other forward has more than three.

Injuries have been a factor up front, as the Panthers had to recently recall three players from the AHL -- Tim Kennedy, Evgenii Dadonov and Michal Repik.

"I'm always tweaking things and that's a blessing and a curse," Dineen said after the Panthers' optional morning skate Wednesday. "You're searching for chemistry. If I see it a snapshot of some chemistry, that's something I certainly am going to try to encourage and stay with.

"I'm fairly patient when it comes to that, and obviously with Michal Repik and Tim Kennedy and Dads in the lineup, it's changed our dynamic a little bit and it's important that you really engage those players and make them feel a part of it. That's what we're trying to do."

Dineen didn't dismiss the possibility of breaking up his top line at some point to try to generate more balanced offensive production.

"Obviously, we haven't tweaked Weisser's line and that's always maybe even tempting to say, let's put somebody on there to get them going," Dineen said. "We'll see where we go with that."

Dineen said Wednesday morning he hadn't decided whether Jose Theodore or Jacob Markstrom would be in net against the Rangers.

Theodore has started the last three games and played well, but Dineen said he was intrigued by the idea of Markstrom going against fellow Swede Henrik Lundqvist.

"You know what, Swede vs. Swede is very enticing (vs.) going with the hot hand, it makes for a tough decision for a coach," Dineen said. "I'll probably wait until the last minute to make that call."