In the immortal words of Bugs Bunny, “it’s Duck season.” Game night in Smashville tonight as the Predators begin a four game home stand, all four opponents are in the Western Conference and two of them inside the division. First up, the Anaheim Ducks. After last season’s nasty six game opening round playoff series, it is obvious that there is no love lost between these two teams. From the interesting stick work behind the play, to their former coach’s incessant whining… the bad blood has boiled over.

Nashville has been the dominant team in the recent history of this series, they have won both games so far this season and have gone 5-1-1 on home ice over the last three seasons. Home ice… there’s the rub. The Predators have a losing record on home ice this season. Unusual for this team, this deep into the season, but the opportunity to reverse that is presenting itself.

The Ducks are missing Lubomir Visnovsky and Jason Blake. Saku Koivu is listed as questionable. The Predators get Jordin Tootoo back in the lineup after he finished serving Milan Lucic’s suspension, Blake Geoffrion is still listed on IR. The return of Tootoo is a positive for Nashville as he has been playing some of the best hockey of his career prior to his run in with Buffalo goaltender Ryan Miller. Tootoo’s return has caused Chris Mueller to be reassigned back to Milwaukee.

The Predators are coming off of a wild win in Columbus, one that they should be able to build from. The Ducks are still struggling, the coaching change has had minimal impact and they are coming off a 4-2 loss to the Blues in St. Louis.

If the Predators can repeat the performance from the last three and a half minutes of the Columbus game for a longer period of time tonight, Anaheim will have its’ hands full. Expect things to get nasty quick tonight. Puck drop at 7:07pm. Coverage on Fox Sports Tennessee and 102.5 the Game.

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Random Notes

- Wait, what??? The Florida Panthers are tied for the Eastern Conference lead???

- Cool… daytime hockey today… Noon central on NHL Network. Montreal/New Jersey

- Wow… so a media conglomerate has bought the Leafs? Now what will the Toronto media complain about?

- 24/7 debuts Wednesday… really looking forward to this.

- Expecting some interesting footage on 24/7 from tonight’s Flyer game against Tampa Bay… wonder if we’ll see another four corners?

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The podcast is posted, we welcomed New York Times journalist John Branch, author of a fascinating series in the Times called "Punched Out - The Life and Death of a Hockey Enforcer." We then got a report from the Board of Governor's meeting in California from ESPN.com’s Scott Burnside. We also previewed Saturday night's Anaheim game with Dan Wood, radio color analyst with the Ducks.

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