No, Olivier, turn the other way! Tonight isn’t the night for inflicting damage on recent Stanley Cup champions! The Columbus Blue Jackets continue their road trip with their first time of the year in Raleigh to faceoff against the reigning and defended, undisputed Stanley Cup champions in the Carolina Hurricanes at 7:00p.m. EST.
The defending Stanley Cup champions are as strong as last season with them tidying up their final outstanding contract in RFA Alexander Nikishin, and are off to a fantastic start with an 8-0-0 goalie Pytor Kochetkov. Carolina is also without the services of veteran forwards Taylor Hall and Jordan Staal due to injuries, but just for Seth Jarvis back after offseason surgery.
Carolina is collecting victories by committee, and that’s how the culture there continues to grow. Only skaters that have yet to score a goal that have skated are Staal, Slavin, Carrier, and Reilly. That’s it. Lots of rowdiness to happen at the Lenovo Center.
Columbus is continuing to tinker with the lineup as Bowness figures out a consistent winning combination. Maybe, stick with just worked. The win and lineup got goals last time, why suddenly poor Voronkov and Talbot? Ride the hot hands that were on the ice and collected points.
Carson Soucy cleared waivers and is being loaned to Cleveland as Columbus anticipates the return of Ivan Provorov ahead of their road trip finale in Dallas.
Danton Heinen returns to the lineup after being a healthy scratch the last three games, and bench Dmitry Voronkov instead.
Jet Greaves gets the start on the bench.
Projected Lineups
Carolina Hurricanes
William Carrier -- Sebastian Aho -- Andrei Svechnikov
Nikolaj Ehlers -- Logan Stankoven -- Jackson Blake
Jordan Martinook -- Mark Jankowski -- Seth Jarvis
Eric Robinson -- Jesperi Kotkaniemi -- Nicolas Deslauriers
Jacob Slavin -- Jalen Chatfield
K’Andre Miller -- Sean Walker
Shayne Gostisbehere -- Juuso Valimaki
Pyotr Kochetkov
Brandon Bussi
Scratched: Mike Reilly
Injured: Jordan Staal (calf), Taylor Hall (upper body)
Columbus Blue Jackets
Valeri Nichushkin -- Adam Fantilli -- Kent Johnson
Matthew Knies -- Charlie Coyle -- Mathieu Olivier
Sean Monahan -- Cole Sillinger -- Conor Garland
Danton Heinen -- Luca Del Bel Belluz -- Ryan Lomberg
Zach Werenski -- Damon Severson
Jake Christiansen -- Denton Mateychuk
Dante Fabbro -- Erik Gudbranson
Jet Greaves
Cam Talbot
Scratched: Emil Andrae, Dmitri Voronkov
Injured: Ivan Provorov (lower body), Isac Lundestrom (lower body)
Players to Watch
Columbus — Kent Johnson — 6 goals in the season, 5 points in his last 2 games.
Carolina — Sebastian Aho — top 10 in points with 19 in 14 games.
Predicting the Final Score
CAR — 4
CBJ — 1