The Bad news: The Dallas Stars have lost two games in a row. The good news: The Stars are back at home tonight.
It’s been a weird season in the fact that Dallas is Jekyll/Hyde when you talk about road versus home games. Dallas is 14-3-1 inside the American Airlines Center. Outside of Dallas, the Stars are a dismal 4-12-1.
Think about that as you watch the game tonight, because after tonight the Stars are on the road for the next four games. It doesn’t seem to matter that they’ll be traveling to play the Buffalo Sabres, Detroit Red Wings, Philadelphia Flyers and New Jersey Devils either. Even though all four of those teams are currently out of the playoff picture in the East, it doesn’t matter. Dallas is struggling with those games as well.
That’s why tonight is a huge game for Dallas. Not only are they playing the team in last place in the Atlantic Division, they’re playing at home, and they need all of the points that they can get.
Potential Dallas Lines
Jacob Peterson (40) – Roope Hintz (24) – Joe Pavelski (16)
Denis Gurianov (34) – Jamie Benn (14) – Tyler Seguin (91)
Michael Raffl (18) – Radek Faksa (12) – Luke Glendening (11)
Rhett Gardner (49) – Riley Damiani (13) – Joel Kiviranta (25)
Ryan Suter (20) – Miro Heiskanen (4)
Esa Lindell (23) – John Klingberg (3)
Joel Hanley (44) – Jani Hakanpaa (2)
Jake Oettinger (29)
Denis Gurianov is back from Covid protocols, but per head coach Rick Bowness, his time will be monitored to make sure that there aren’t any lingering effects. Braden Holtby has also exited protocol, but Jake Oettinger gets the start in net. Jacob Peterson draws back in on the top line with Jason Robertson still out with a nagging lower body injury.
The Montreal Canadiens
The Canadiens are a long way away from the team that was in the Stanley Cup Final last season. Since November 29th, Montreal has lost 13 of 14 games and they’ve had nine games postponed. In fact, for the season the Canadiens have only won seven games and have 19 points. Montreal is also on day two of a back to back set, having lost 5-2 on Monday night to the Arizona Coyotes in Glendale.
Montreal doesn’t have anyone that has scored 10 goals on the season. Their team leader is Josh Anderson and Nick Suzuki with seven each. They do have three players who have at least 10 assists but the team leader only has 12 (Suzuki and Tyler Toffoli).
Potential Montreal Lines
Mike Hoffman (68) – Nick Suzuki (14) – Josh Anderson (17)
Rem Pitlick (32) – Christian Dvorak (28) – Jonathan Drouin (92)
Artturi Lehkonen (62) – Jake Evans (71) – Joel Armia (40)
Laurent Dauphin (45) – Ryan Poehling (25) – Cole Canfield (22)
Ben Chiarot (8) – David Savard (58)
Alexander Romanov (27) – Jeff Petry (26)
Brett Kulak (77) – Chris Wideman (20)
Cayden Primeau (30)
Samuel Montembeault (35)