Patrice Bergeron, who's missed the last two games with a lower-body injury, will not play tonight. Bergeron joined the team toward the end of the morning skate, doing some stretching and then skating hard with the puck, but concluded he wouldn't be ready to go.

"It's getting better," said Bergeron. "I'm hoping every day that I'll be all right, but it's just not there. Talking to [trainer] Donny [DelNegro] and the staff, it might be better to wait another day."

Dave Lewis said Bergeron will most likely skate again tomorrow morning in Toronto.

"But I seriously doubt he'd be able to play," Lewis cautioned.

* Tim Thomas will start tonight. While Lewis said previously that he wanted to get Hannu Toivonen some action either tonight or tomorrow, he didn't commit to starting the 22-year-old against the Maple Leafs.

* Mark Stuart will play tonight in place of Jason York. Stuart was a healthy scratch in the first two games of the road trip. Tomorrow's plan, according to Lewis, calls for York playing against the Leafs and Stuart being scratched again.

* Players who didn't skate this morning: Thomas, Zdeno Chara, Marc Savard, Marco Sturm.

* The Bruins enjoyed last night's dinner at a downtown steak house, courtesy of Savard's credit card. "Tremendous," said Jason York. "Very nice gesture by Mr. Savard."

* The likely lineup for tonight, although the defensive pairings might be adjusted because of Stuart:

Axelsson-Savard-Murray
Sturm-Kessel-Bochenski
Reich-Mowers-Donovan
Tenkrat-Boyes-Chistov

Allen-Chara
Alberts-Ference
Stuart-Mara

Thomas