The Boston Bruins and Carolina Hurricanes will renew an old rivalry when they play in the Eastern Conference Final.
Game 1 of the best-of-7 series is at TD Garden on Thursday (8 p.m. ET; NBCSN, CBC, SN, TVAS). The Bruins will be without defenseman Charlie McAvoy, who is suspended one game for an illegal check to the head against Columbus Blue Jackets forward Josh Anderson in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Second Round on Monday.
This will be the third time the teams will face off in the Stanley Cup Playoffs since the Hurricanes moved to North Carolina from Hartford in 1997 and the fifth time they've played against each other in the postseason. The Bruins defeated their former regional rivals, the Hartford Whalers, in the 1990 and '91 Adams Division Semifinals.
The Hurricanes defeated the Bruins in seven games in the 2009 conference semifinals. That was the last time Carolina qualified for the playoffs and reached the conference final, where it was swept by the Pittsburgh Penguins.
The Bruins eliminated the Blue Jackets on Monday to advance to the conference final for the first time since 2013, when they reached the Stanley Cup Final before losing to the Chicago Blackhawks.
Boston (49-24-9), which finished second in the Eastern Conference and Atlantic Division during the regular season with 107 points, won the last three games against Columbus by a combined score of 11-4.
"If you're playing this time of year, you're doing something right and building something great as a team," Bruins goalie Tuukka Rask said. "So we're super happy to be in this position and we'll try to keep the train rolling."
Carolina (46-29-7), which qualified as the first wild card into the playoffs from the East with 99 points, has won six straight since losing 6-0 to the Washington Capitals in Game 5 of the first round. The winning streak is the second-longest in Hurricanes/Whalers playoff history behind a seven-game run in 2006, when the Hurricanes won the Stanley Cup.
"The journey that we've been on -- and, obviously, the road isn't over -- we're still creating it ourselves," Hurricanes forward and captain Justin Williams said "But it's been quite a change around here certainly in the past few months. Everybody's believing in each other and you see what happens."