Music: {allcanada} Canadiens have company as they prepare for Bruins

Saturday, November 22, 2014

{allcanada} Canadiens have company as they prepare for Bruins

Christmas - Michael Bublé / Wintersong - Sarah McLachlan

BOSTON -- A road trip to face the Boston Bruins brings with it plenty of hype for the Montreal Canadiens.

Their current trip to Boston, however, has a little added twist.

Prior to their morning skate at TD Garden on Saturday the Canadiens posed for a team picture along with the mothers and daughters who got to travel to Boston with their sons and other members of the Canadiens staff.

Last season the Canadiens took their fathers on a road trip.

"It is a different feeling. I can't say it's good or bad or any way, but it's a little bit different," Montreal forward Brendan Gallagher said. "I think everyone's on a little bit better behavior around their moms. They're always watching to make sure you're doing the right things. I know my mom's making sure I'm eating my vegetables. So it's a little bit different for me on the road. But it's fun to have them here."

Having family around before a big Atlantic Division game can present challenges, but the Canadiens aren't looking at the moms and daughters as a distraction.

"I think as a professional athlete, your job is to prepare regardless of the situation and the atmosphere; you have to be able to do your job," defenseman P.K. Subban said. "So I think more importantly it's a special day for us. It's a special trip to have your mom here. I don't know how many athletes get the opportunity to bring their mom on a road trip. For us it's something special. We got to do the fathers last year. So it's very special. I'm very happy to have my mom here and it says something about the organization, the Montreal Canadiens and what they're all about."

Defenseman Bryan Allen will make his Canadiens debut, according to coach Michel Therrien. Allen was acquired in a trade with the Anaheim Ducks for forward Rene Bourque on Thursday. Therrien knows what he wants Allen to do in his first game.

"Play his game. You know he's been in the League for a long time. We want him to defend, we want him to be physical, he's going to kill penalties," Therrien said. "It's going to take some time to get used to about the way we play, and this morning we had a short talk and we showed him the fundamentals about the way that we play regarding our structure. But we want him to be himself."

The Bruins, who won a seven-round shootout Friday on the road against the Columbus Blue Jackets, didn't have a morning skate.

Here are the projected lineups:

CANADIENS

Max Pacioretty – David Desharnais – Pierre-Alexandre Parenteau

Alex Galchenyuk – Tomas Plekanec – Brendan Gallagher

Brandon Prust – Lars Eller – Jiri Sekac

Manny Malhotra – Dale Weise

Andrei Markov – P.K. Subban

Alexei Emelin – Sergei Gonchar

Bryan Allen – Mike Weaver

Tom Gilbert

Carey Price

Dustin Tokarski

Scratched: Drayson Bowman, Nathan Beaulieu

Injured: Michael Bournival (shoulder)

BRUINS

Matt Fraser – Patrice Bergeron – Reilly Smith

Chris Kelly – Carl Soderberg – Loui Eriksson

Milan Lucic – Alexander Khokhlachev – Seth Griffith

Simon Gagne – Gregory Campbell – Daniel Paille

Dennis Seidenberg – Kevan Miller

Joe Morrow – Dougie Hamilton

Matt Bartkowski – Torey Krug

Tuukka Rask

Niklas Svedberg

Scratched: Zach Trotman

Injured: Zdeno Chara (knee), David Krejci (undisclosed), Brad Marchand (undisclosed), David Warsofsky (groin), Adam McQuaid (thumb)

Status update: According to Therrien, the Canadiens will dress seven defensemen. Beaulieu was scratched for the win against the St. Louis Blues on Thursday. … Krejci and Marchand are day-to-day. Marchand skated Saturday morning.

Who's hot: Pacioretty had four goals and seven points in the past five games. … Bartkowski had been scratched seven straight games before playing the past two. He has three assists in those two games.

Miracle On 34th Street (1947) / Miracle On 34th Street (1994)