Morning Skate: Red Wings At Canucks
Game 8
10:00p ET, Rogers Arena
Vancouver, BC
TV: Fox Sports Detroit , CBC
Radio: 97.1 The Ticket
Canucks Blog: Nucks Misconduct
There's no time to dwell on the frustrating overtime loss to the dirty Flames last night, because the Wings get to take out their anger (I assume they're angry, like I am) on the Canucks tonight. We're seeing the team make some progress in learning and executing the new, improved, system under Blashill, but there's still work to be done. Sure losing games sucks, but there are some very deeply ingrained habits the players have to rid themselves of; it's going to take time. Last game Coach Blashill changed up his defensive pairings and we finally got rid of top pairing defenseman Jonathan Ericsson and traded him in for bottom pairing defenseman Jonathan Ericsson. That is until Mike Green received this hit last night and had to leave the game. He has what appears to be a shoulder injury and is questionable for tonight.
The Canucks lost their last game 3-2 on Thursday night against the Washington Capitals and have lost their last 3 games. Someone's losing streak is going to end tonight, it should be the Wings'.
The Expected Lineups
Forwards
| Justin Abdelkader | Henrik Zetterberg | Gustav Nyquist |
| Tomas Tatar | Dylan Larkin | Teemu Pulkkinen |
| Darren Helm | Riley Sheahan | Luke Glendening |
| Drew Miller | Joakim Andersson | Landon Ferraro |
Defensemen
| Niklas Kronwall | Mike Green? |
| Kyle Quincey | Danny DeKeyser |
| Jonathan Ericsson | Brendan Smith |
Goaltenders
| Petr Mrazek (starting) |
| Jimmy Howard |
Scratches: Tomas Jurco, Jakub Kindl.
Injuries: Johan Franzen (Head), Pavel Datsyuk (Ankle), Brad Richards (Back)
Forwards
| Daniel Sedin | Henrik Sedin | Radim Vrbata |
| Alexandre Burrows | Brandon Sutters | Jannik Hansen |
| Sven Baertschi | Bo Horvat | Jake Virtanen |
| Brandon Prust | Jared McCann | Derek Dorsett |
Defensemen
| Dan Hamhuis | Chris Tanev |
| Alexander Edler | Matt Bartkowski |
| Ben Hutton | Luca Sbisa |
Goaltenders
| Ryan Miller (starting) |
| Richard Bachman |
| CANUCKS | THE MATCH-UP | RED WINGS |
| 3-2-2 (8 pts; 2nd in Pacific) | Record | 3-3-1 (7 pts; 5th in Atlantic) |
| 2.43 (19th in NHL) | Goals Per Game | 2.57 (16th in NHL) |
| 2.00 (4th) | Goals Against Per Game | 2.71 (17th) |
| 8.7% (27th) | Power Play % | 17.4% (18th) |
| 88.2% (5th) | Penalty Kill % | 80.8% (18th) |
| 5 Tied with (2 goals) | Goal Leader | Justin Abdelkader (4 goals) |
| Daniel Sedin (5 points) | Points Leader | Henrik Zetterberg (10 points) |
LET'S GO RED WINGS!!!
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Game Day Prediction Contest
Would you like to predict the outcome of the game and potentially become internet famous? Well you're in luck, because here's your opportunity. Here's how it works.
Make your game predictions on the winning team, final score, and who the Wings player of the game will be. Enter the required information into the form below using the formats indicated in the questions. If you don't use those formats, your answers will be disregarded. All submissions are timestamped and will be accepted only until the official game start time. All other submissions after that will be disregarded. Only one submission per person, please. POTG will be determined by the collective of WiiM writers.
Each correct winning team prediction is worth 1 point. Each correct player of the game prediction is worth 2 points. Each correct final score prediction is worth 5 points. If you get all three correct you'll receive 15 points.