The Red Wings get a much needed boost on offense tonight as Pavel Datsyuk returns from injury tonight when the Wings take on the New York Rangers at 7:30PM ET from the Joe.
Datsyuk will hopefully provide that much needed boost after Detroit was shut out on consecutive nights against Columbus on Friday night and Saturday night against Nashville.
“We haven’t played very well in the last few games, so it’ll be nice to get some energy in our lineup,” coach Mike Babcock said after today’s morning skate. “We got to work way harder than we have.
“We’ve put up a couple of bagels the last two nights. … So we got to get ready to get to the net, get some second chances and compete harder on the inside.”
According to Ansar Khan of Mlive.com, the Wings will also face Martin Biron in net tonight for the Rangers instead of All Star Henrik Lundqvist. Biron is 8-5-0, with a 2.07 goals-against average and .923 save percentage. Lundqvist is 21-17-4, with a 2.35 GAA and .922 save percentage.
Unfortunately though Tomas Holmstrom is out while he continues to recover from a broken hand as well. He is hoping to return Wednesday night when the Wings take on Nashville but Khan says that’s being a bit optimistic.
“I started battling and I couldn’t push away,” Holmstrom said. “Shooting for Wednesday but we’ll see. It gets better and better every day (but) it’s too painful when I did some battling drills.”
Here is tonight’s anticipated lineups according to Khan…
Franzen-Zetterberg-Bertuzzi
Hudler-Datsyuk-Cleary
Abdelkader-Filppula-Eaves
Draper-Helm-Miller
Lidstrom-Kronwall
Ericsson-Rafalski
Kindl-Salei
Howard (starting)
MacDonald
Here are the lines the Rangers used in their last game, a 2-0 loss in Montreal on Saturday:
Vinny Prospal-Erik Christensen-Marian Gaborik
Brandon Dubinsky-Artem Anisimov-Ryan Callahan
Wojtek Wolski-Derek Stepan-Mats Zuccarello
Sean Avery-Brian Boyle-Brandon Prust
Marc Staal-Dan Girardi
Michael Del Zotto-Matt Gilroy
Ryan McDonagh-Mike Sauer
Martin Biron (starting)
Henrik Lundqvist
Here are a few other things of note…
- Chris Osgood will hopefully be back on the ice in full gear Tuesday after having sports hernia surgery on January 11th. “Hopefully I’ll have some idea of how long it’ll be from that point,” Osgood said. “I feel pretty good. I don’t have any pain or issues like I did before.”
- Forward Jan Mursak will be sent back to Grand Rapids as soon as the swollen big toe on his left foot heals, hopefully later in the week. “I can barely walk in the skate. I’m not able to skate,” Mursak said. “I was almost 100 percent sure it’s broken. It was pretty painful. But they said it’s not broken. It’s pretty swollen, it’s sore right now, but I’m sure I’ll be ready in a couple of days to play.” Mursak was reportedly hit by a shot from Nashville’s Shea Weber on Saturday.
Source: Mlive.com
