Chuck Kobasew will make his Boston debut tonight against Colorado.

Last week, Dave Lewis didn't think that Kobasew would be ready until this weekend. But in the last few days, Kobasew's fractured right elbow progressed to a point where he'll be ready for game action tonight at TD Banknorth Garden.

"All of a sudden in the last couple days, he feels much better," said Lewis. "The doctors looked at him, the training staff looked at him, and they feel he's 100 percent ready to go. That's a bit of a surprise in my eye. I was anticipating not until this weekend. But it's good. It'll be fun to see him and his teammates on the ice."

Kobasew suffered his injury on Jan. 26 against Minnesota. In 40 games this season, Kobasew has four goals and 13 assists.

* Kobasew will start on the fourth line alongside Phil Kessel and Brandon Bochenski. Stanislav Chistov will be the healthy scratch.

* The sixth-defenseman rotation will continue tonight. Bobby Allen, scratched on Sunday, will play tonight. Jason York will sit out. Lewis called it a platoon situation.

* Although he's finished the last two games on Boston's third line with Mark Mowers and Shean Donovan, P.J. Axelsson will start tonight on the No. 1 line with Marc Savard and Glen Murray. "There's a safety level," Lewis said of using Axelsson as a component of Boston's checking line. "It's worked." The MAD line went against Scott Gomez's trio on Sunday and also saw regular shifts against Saku Koivu's unit on Saturday.

* Tim Thomas, refreshed from a night off against New Jersey, will start tonight. "It was nice to relax and see the game from a different angle," said Thomas, who got a breather thanks to Joey MacDonald.

* MacDonald is expecting his new Bruins mask to arrive either today or tomorrow.

* Lewis conducts his interviews following the morning skate directly in front of the doors leading to the Boston dressing room, which turned out to be a bad location today. This morning, assistant coach Doug Houda opened the door and jostled several media members while Lewis was in mid-sentence. "Sorry," said Lewis as Houda laughed. "My crack coaching staff."

* Tonight's expected lineup:

Axelsson-Savard-Murray
Sturm-Bergeron-Tenkrat
Reich-Mowers-Donovan
Kobasew-Kessel-Bochenski

Chara-Ward
Alberts-Ference
Allen-Wideman

Thomas