Panthers' Thomas not playing in return to Boston

Thursday, 11.07.2013 / 1:12 PM

By Matt Kalman - NHL.com Correspondent / 2013-2014 At the Rink Blog

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BOSTON -- There will be no homecoming for Tim Thomas on Thursday in Boston.

Although the goaltender traveled with the Florida Panthers for the game against his old team, the Boston Bruins, Panthers coach Kevin Dineen said the two-time Vezina Trophy winner remains on injured reserve and will not play. Thomas, who faced the Bruins in a 3-2 loss Oct. 17 in Florida, has not played at TD Garden since leaving the Bruins for a one-season sabbatical following the 2012 Stanley Cup Playoffs.

Scott Clemmensen, a Boston College alum, will get the start for the Panthers, who are 0-2-4 in their past six games. In six career NHL games at the Garden, Clemmensen is 3-2-0 with a 3.14 goals-against average and .905 save percentage.

"That gives us a good option," Dineen said of Clemmensen playing in Boston. "It's like a lot of things. We have depth at every position and we've certainly taken advantage of it early."

The Bruins have greater concerns than which Florida goaltender they're going to face; they enter Thursday with one win in their past five games (1-3-1).

"I'm just looking for our identity basically," Bruins coach Claude Julien said. "It's more of ... we're not playing the way we should and we know that. We all know it. We know that we're certainly not making good decisions out there, we're not getting the results we want. You have to work through it and find your game. It's a term you use all the time when you get tired of losing -- you do something about it. So it's one of those situations where we keep working hard at trying to rectify our game and it's an opportunity here [Thursday] to go out and show that we have made some progress."

Here are the projected lineups for both teams:

BRUINS

Milan Lucic - David Krejci - Jarome Iginla

Brad Marchand - Patrice Bergeron - Loui Eriksson

Carl Soderberg - Chris Kelly - Reilly Smith

Daniel Paille - Gregory Campbell - Shawn Thornton

Zdeno Chara - Johnny Boychuk

Dennis Seidenberg - Dougie Hamilton

Torey Krug - Adam McQuaid

Tuukka Rask

Chad Johnson

Scratched: Matt Bartkowski, Jordan Caron