Maybe the most interesting thing about this game is going to be how we match up against the Bruins physically. Both Eric and Jordan are among the harder forwards in the league to control in front of the net. Almost the entire rest of our team is on the small, speedy side which tends to give the Bruins fits, particularly since we draw a lot of penalties and we know how that goes against the Bruins (this isn't just an issue with the Hurricanes, BTW, it's also historically been an issue for them with the Habs as well).
On top of that, we are getting a ton of shots on goal lately, and a Claude Julien team tends to allow a lot of shots on goal provided they are of a fairly low quality. So shooting percentages are going to be an issue, particularly for Alex Semin who really needs to have a good game if we're going to score enough to win.
The one last thing that I'm going to be looking at is their forwards operating in front of our net. Faulk (if he plays), Gleason and Harrison are going to have a lot of big bodies on their hands, and we can't afford to have them losing those battles. Even more so, we need the rest of the defense, the small guys who don't generally do a whole lot of controlling bodies in front of the net, to really stand up and give us a hard nosed game. We can't have Lucic and Horton walking around in front of the net banging rebounds past the goalie without anybody putting a body on them.
I agree that this is going to be a measuring stick game. It'll be interesting to see which team imposes their style on the other. I think the timing is good here, this team really needs to have a serious test of their ability to play physically demanding game against a tough opponent and come out on top. And it's a great time for Ward to come out and bounce back from his slow start. Looking for a close matchup that's going to go right down to the wire, possibly to overtime.