The Colorado Avalanche scored full points during their intense tour of Canada earlier this week. The home team Detroit Red Wings, in turn, have been rested for a few days before the meeting with the Stanley Cup champion.
Detroit Red Wings – Colorado Avalanche
At 18.55, TV2 and Arenan
Commentator: Anders Nordenswan
The Avalanche come with four straight wins, the last three coming from the trip to Canada, where Colorado beat Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa in turn.
The expected great form seems to have arrived despite the list of injured players being crushing: Artturi Lehkonen, Gabriel Landeskog, Josh Manson, Pavel Francouz, Erik Johnson, Darren Helm, Kurtis MacDermid.
Feels like the personnel shortage has put the team together and the champions still have every chance to win the Central Division and even the entire Western Conference.
Tonight’s home team, the Detroit Red Wings, have practically lost their chances of making it to the playoffs, but a terrorist chance to grab the last wild card ticket lives on. So there should still be hope and spark in the gang.
Detroit has been rested for a few days after the road loss against another desperate team, the Nashville Predators. Before that, the Red Wings played two nights in a row against superb Boston: loss away, win at home was the balance.
Finländarna: Rantanen mot Määttä och Husso
Mikko Rantanen became the most effective Finnish goal scorer in the 2000s with goal number 45. Now he has bara Teemu Selänne with 48 goals in front of him. Then it’s 50 goals as the third Finn after Selänne and Kurri.
Detroit’s Finns specialize in shutting down opposing scorers. Second pair back Olli Määttä is the Red Wings’ most reliable defensive defender and is guaranteed to play around 20 minutes tonight as well.
The tip is that Ville Husso guards the goal for the team from the motor city and does it very well once again. Detroit’s first pick basically always gives their team a chance to play for the win.
Keep an eye on Colorado’s middle lane
Ever since the season started, the big topic of discussion regarding Colorado has been the center position. Nazem Kadri, who was an extremely important piece in the championship team, is now found in Calgary and no one has managed to take his place.
Everyone who spoke was more or less convinced that the “Avs” will pick up Jonathan Toews, Ryan O’Reilly, Bo Horvath or Kevin Hayes for the role of second center. Instead, they had to make do with Danish veteran Lars Eller.
Eller is at best a third center and that means Colorado’s center crew is: Nathan MacKinnon, JT Compher, Lars Eller and Alex Newhook. Is it enough to go far this spring? See for yourself and judge.
Commentator’s tip: rested Detroit wins in front of home crowd
Colorado narrowly held off Ottawa’s onslaught in Friday night’s game. The team looked worn out and is still on the move.
The Red Wings are a team that, so to speak, always come to play and the somewhat strange team in the NHL jungle is that worse teams are often very good at tormenting top teams when they are expected to act as point machines.
Add in the fact that Detroit and Colorado have an intense hate-hate relationship that was born in the 1990s and everything is set for the Red Wings to keep the playoff dream half alive and knock the Avalanche off. Odd-goal victory for Detroit to the unbridled joy of the hammam fans on Saturday.
