Cassidy gives an update on Bergeron, Rask, Ritchie and Kase.

The Boston Bruins, despite having a long layoff ahead of these Stanley Cup Finals, were missing some key pieces of their line up during their first game of the Eastern Conference round robin, most notably goaltender Tuukka Rask.

On Monday Bruins head coach Bruce Cassidy was able to provide an update on several of those players and thankfully for the Bruins most of the news today was good news. First, Cassidy provided an update on Ondrej Kase which was perhaps the one bit of not so good news, indicating that the 24 year old would continue to be absent and would not play on Wednesday against the Tampa Bay Lightning. He did however also add that Kase could play at some point this weekend, but he was non committal on that front. 

On the Tuukka Rask front however the news was much better, after missing the first game Rask was back out on the ice with his teammates on Monday and is expected to start that aforementioned game against the Lightning this week. After the Bruins suffered a bad loss at the hands of the Flyers in Game 1 the return of Rask will no doubt be very well received. Rask will not be alone however, it sounds like 24 year old forward Nick Ritchie will also be entering the lineup on Wednesday, a big deal given that the Bruins gave up forward Danton Heinen in a trade with the Anaheim Ducks in order to bring Ritchie in ahead of the playoffs. 

There were also some concerns surrounding the status of Bruins star forward Patrice Bergeron given that he was absent from practice on Monday, but Cassidy waived those concerns away when fielding questions from the media. Cassidy informed reporters that Bergeron had simply been given a maintenance day on Monday and indicated that he expected the Bruins forward to make his return to the ice on Tuesday. No doubt there will be many eyes on Bergeron if he does return to the ice on Tuesday in an effort to notice if the often injured Bruins forward is currently dealing with some type of ailment or injury. 

Overall a lot of good news for the Bruins on Monday with perhaps more to come over the weekend.