Following a much needed road win over the Montreal Canadiens the New Jersey Devils are back at home to play host to the Colorado Avalanche.
As many predicted the Avalanche have stumbled mightily out of the gate picking up just nine wins in their first 24 games.
Defense continues to be the Avalanche's biggest problem as they struggle to get the puck up ice and are often hemmed into their own zone as a result. That, of course, leads to a lot of shots against which helps explain why the Avalanche allow more than three goals per game.
The Avs undeniably possess a handful of high quality forwards but there isn't much depth behind them. If their stars don't fill the net early and often the Avalanche simply don't win.
Doing that will certainly be a tall order tonight as they're in the latter half of a back-to-back and are up against a red hot Cory Schneider who has posted a .920 save percentage or better in 12 of his last 13 games.
If Schneider is able to continue this trend the Devils have a great chance of winning the game and crawling back into a playoff spot in the process.
LINEUPS Cammalleri - Henrique - Stempniak Elias - Zajac - Palmieri Kalinin - Josefson - Kennedy Farnham - Gionta - Tootoo
Greene - Larsson Moore - Severson Gelinas - Merrill
Schneider
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Landeskog - Mackinnon - Duchene Comeau - Soderberg - McLeod Grigorenko - Martinsen - Iginla Agozzino - Wagner - Skille
Beauchemin - Johnson Holden - Barrie Gormley - Redmond
Varlamov
WHAT TO WATCH 1) John Moore hasn't played much on the power play this season but Saturday night in Montreal he took Damon Severson's spot on the top unit and led the team with almost three PP minutes. It will be interesting to see if that was a one-game thing or if the top PP QB spot is Moore's to run with.
2) The Landeskog - Mackinnon - Duchene line will be a handful to say the least but if the Greene - Larsson pairing can limit the damage they cause the Devils will be in great shape. There aren't many guys in Colorado's lineup who can do damage in the bottom-9.
3) Adam Henrique is riding a four-game point streak and has five points (three goals, two assists) in that span. One would think he'll have plenty of chances to extend that streak against a poor defensive team in the Avs.
The game is at 7 eastern and can be seen on MSG+ and Altitude.
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