Though it hasn’t been pretty at times, the Bruins enter tonight’s game with the Lightning with a two-game winning streak thanks in large part to the play of Tuukka Rask. The 2014 Vezina Winner makes his third straight start as the Black and Gold conclude their four-game road trip in Tampa.

The always lethal and high-powered Lightning snapped their three-game losing streak in Brooklyn on Tuesday with a 6-1 thrashing of the Islanders. The win came at a cost though as Jonathan Drouin left the game after taking a shot to the head from Isles defenseman Calvin de Hann and will miss tonight’s game.

Although their defense has been suspect at times, the Lightning come in with the seventh-highest goal total in the league at 32 through 10 games. The work in progress Bruins defense will have a tall task ahead of them against the likes Steven Stamkos, Nikita Kucherov, Ondrej Palat, Tyler Johnson, Alex Killorn and the rest of the highly-skilled Bolts.

Gametime: 7:30 p.m.
TV/Radio: NESN/98.5 The Sports Hub
Records: Bruins 5-4-0 (10 points), Lightning 6-4-0 (12 points)
Location: Amalie Arena

Bruins projected lines

Brad Marchand-Patrice Bergeron-David Pastrnak
Ryan Spooner-David Krejci-Austin Czarnik
Sean Kuraly-Riley Nash-Jimmy Hayes
Tim Schaller-Dominic Moore-Noel Acciari

Zdeno Chara-Brandon Carlo
Torey Krug-Adam McQuaid
John-Michael Liles-Colin Miller

Tuukka Rask
Zane McIntyre

Lightning projected lines

Ondrej Palat-Steven Stamkos-Nikita Kucherov
Alex Killorn-Tyler Johnson-Brayden Point
Ryan Callahan-Valtteri Filppula-J.T. Brown
Brian Boyle-Cedric Paquette-Vladislav Namestnikov

Victor Hedman-Anton Stralman
Jason Garrison-Andrej Suster
Slater Koekkoek-Brayden Coburn

Ben Bishop
Andrei Vasilevskiy

Tonight’s storylines

David Pastrnak returns to the Bruins lineup after serving a two-game suspension for his hit to the head of Rangers defenseman Dan Girardi. (Photo by Joe Makarski, Bruins Daily)

– David Pastrnak returns from his two-game suspension slotting in his usual spot on the Bruins top line with Brad Marchand and Patrice Bergeron. Though the Bruins did go 2-0 without him, head coach Claude Julien and company sorely missed his offense as the team combined to score just three goals. The 20-year-old, who has five goals and three assists, tallied at least one point in all but two of his seven games played. Will this suspension be the start of a downward trend for Pastrnak? Or will he pick up right where he left off. We’ll see how engaged he is in his first game back.

– Looking for any spark from his third line, Julien is inserting Sean Kuraly into the third line in place of Matt Beleskey. This will mark Kuraly’s NHL debut a year after he was acquired in the Martin Jones trade from the San Jose Sharks. Known more for his defensive game, many scouts (including good friend Kirk Luedeke) peg Kuraly to be a third or fourth liner at the NHL level. In eight games with Providence, Kuraly tallied just one assist. Whether he makes an impact or not remains to be seen, but given the third line struggles all season, it’s at least worth a try to plug Kuraly in before David Backes returns to the lineup from his elbow procedure.

– With one of the third liners heading to watch tonight’s game from the press box there’s another that maybe joining him down the road. The struggles of Beleskey and fellow winger Jimmy Hayes have been well documented since last season. Through nine games, the two combined for zero points and a minus-14 rating. Perhaps the message of Beleskey being scratched will resonate with Hayes, who has gone 25 straight games without tallying a point. But time is starting to run out for Dorchester’s own to prove that he is worth the $2.3 million investment the team made in the former Boston College standout.