The New York Islanders are set to host the Boston Bruins — one of last spring’s playoff victims, teehee — with the NHL (and the world) facing a new, quickly accelerating surge in COVID cases, just as people are looking forward to getting together again over winter holidays, damn it.
There are big batches of cases around the NHL — and more stringent, 2020-esque league protocols are on the way — but pertinent to tonight’s game (before any additional news today) is that the Bruins will miss both their key tool Brad Marchand and now their star center Patrice Bergeron due to COVID Protocol.