Morning Skate: Red Wings at Dallas Stars
8:30p ET, American Airlines Center
Dallas, TX
TV: FS-D, FS-SW
Radio: 97.1 FM The Ticket // 1270 AM CBS Sports Radio
Stars Blog: Defending Big D
The Red Wings head into Dallas off an emotional win on Saturday in the Stadium Series game at Coors Field. Last time they met the Stars, they were also coming off a bit of an emotional win, as they had previously beaten the Leafs in Toronto during Hall of Fame weekend. That game didn't come out too well, as the Wings gave up two empty-netters and ended up with a 4-1 loss.
In familiar faces news, it looks like Patrick Eaves is going to miss this one with an undisclosed illness that's had him out all week. Mattias Janmark moved from the Wings' pipeline to the Stars' lineup in the Erik Cole trade last season and he's done very well for himself, putting up 13 goals and 25 points so far in his rookie campaign. Tell yourself all day things would have been better if he had been kept in Grand Rapids, I guess. Good for him. Oh, Jim Nill is also a former Red Wing.
The Wings need these points more than the Stars, but Dallas wants to keep pace with Chicago and they're a very good team this season. The Stars can score seemingly at will. Fortunately, they're also a team that can score five goals and lose, with questions about overall defensive responsibility and goaltending. The Wings will need to play a well-structured game to win.
Since today is the trade deadline, we're kind of guessing on lines/combos. If one of these teams makes a move, their new piece isn't going to be in the lineup tonight anyway, but both of these teams are reported to have guys on the block right now too. We'll see what happens.
Red Wings Expected Lineups
Forwards
Henrik Zetterberg | Pavel Datsyuk | Justin Abdelkader |
Gustav Nyquist | Riley Sheahan | Tomas Tatar |
Brad Richards | Andreas Athanasiou | Dylan Larkin |
Darren Helm | Luke Glendening | Tomas Jurco |
Defensemen
Kyle Quincey | Danny DeKeyser |
Niklas Kronwall | Alexey Marchenko |
Jonathan Ericsson | Mike Green |
Goaltenders
Petr Mrazek (starting) |
Jimmy Howard |
Scratches: Teemu Pulkkinen, Brendan Smith
Injuries: Drew Miller (torn meniscus/ACL surgery), Johan Franzen (concussion)
Stars Expected Lineups
Forwards
Jamie Benn | Tyler Seguin | Valeri Nichushkin |
Mattias Janmark | Jason Spezza | Ales Hemsky |
Antoine Roussel | Cody Eakin | Patrick Sharp |
Vernon Fiddler | Radek Faksa | Colton Sceviour |
Defensemen
Alex Goligoski | John Klingberg |
Johnny Oduya | Jason Demers |
Jyrki Jokipakka | Patrik Nemeth |
Goaltenders
Antti Niemi |
Kari Lehtonen |
STARS | THE MATCH-UP | RED WINGS |
38-19-6 (82 pts; 2nd in Central) | Record | 31-20-11 (73 pts; 4th in Atlantic) |
3.21 (2nd in NHL) | Goals Per Game | 2.52 (21st in NHL) |
2.84 (23rd) | Goals Against Per Game | 2.52 (13th) |
22.1% (4th) | Power Play % | 17.2% (25th) |
79.3% (24th) | Penalty Kill % | 81.9% (13th) |
Jamie Benn & Tyler Seguin (32 goals) | Goals Leader | Dylan Larkin (19 goals) |
Jamie Benn (70 points) | Points Leader | Henrik Zetterberg (41 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.