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The Calgary Flames opened their four-game road trip with a much-needed win against a Minnesota team they're in direct competition with for a playoff spot.
The Wild's underlying numbers have been poor this season but they possess a lot of talent, and entered their meeting with a remarkable 14-4-2 record on home soil, so they were still a good test for Calgary.
The Flames will face an even tougher one tonight when they take on the Tampa Bay Lightning.
The Bolts lead the league in wins, points, goals, goal differential, have excellent underlying numbers, as much star power as any team in the league, and a goaltender playing at a Vezina caliber level in Andrei Vasilevskiy.
Calgary certainly needs to be at their best tonight if they're going to have a chance of extending their winning streak to five games.
Here are the projected lineups:
Calgary
Johnny Gaudreau - Sean Monahan - Michael Ferland
Matthew Tkachuk - Mikael Backlund - Troy Brouwer
Sam Bennett - Mark Jankowski - Garnet Hathaway
Curtis Lazar - Matt Stajan - Andrew Mangiapane
Mark Giordano - Dougie Hamilton
T.J. Brodie - Travis Hamonic
Brett Kulak - Michael Stone
Mike Smith
Tampa Bay (via DailyFaceoff.com)
Chris Kunitz - Steven Stamkos - Nikita Kucherov
Ondrej Palat - Brayden Point - Tyler Johnson
Alex Killorn - Yanni Gourde - Vladislav Namestnikov
J.T. Brown - Cedric Paquette - Ryan Callahan
Victor Hedman - Jake Dotchin
Mikhail Sergachev - Anton Stralman
Braydon Coburn - Andrej Sustr
Andrei Vasilevskiy
What to watch:
1) The Palat - Point - Johnson line has been as dominant as pretty much any in hockey since being assembled. At 5v5, they own a 57.6 Corsi For% and have out-scored their opponents 13-2(!). They'll likely see a lot of the Flames' top line – with Victor Hedman's pairing behind them – so I probably wouldn't expect multi-point nights from the big guns again.
2) The Tkachuk - Backlund - Brouwer line has an expected goals for% below 40 and they've looked really out of sync without Michael Frolik. If they see a steady dose of Tampa Bay's top line, and that will likely be the case, the Flames could be in trouble. Brouwer is just not a fit there.
3) Tampa Bay ranks 2nd in expected goals against/60 on the penalty kill while Calgary's power play has been toothless for a while now. This is not a good spot for them to get back on track.
4) Mike Smith has been red hot of late posting a .914 save percentage or better in seven of nine, and allowing no more than three goals in any of those games. He'll have to do that again for the Flames to have a shot in this one.
5) Mangiapane continues to get a couple good looks every night despite limited ice and horrible linemates. Will this be the game he gets a few extra shifts to showcase himself? Probably not, but we could hope. I think Brouwer's skating is going to be exposed big time against the Kucherov line.
Puck drop is just after 7:30 eastern and can be seen on SNW, SUN, and TVAS.
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