Update (4:42 PM): Helene St. James now reports Darren Helm will be back in as well, which should mean Chris Conner will be out. – Matt
Update (1:34 PM): Homer was right: he will be back today. Per team press release, he’s been activated off STIR and Nyquist has been returned to Grand Rapids.
Also, Steve Montador’s in for Chicago after all. And Crawford’s the confirmed starter. - Matt
Briefly:
… This is just the second meeting between these two teams this season. The Blackhawks won the first 3-2 on December 30th.
… Since then, they’ve gone 0-3-0, dropping games to Edmonton, Philadelphia and Colorado. That most recent loss, to the Avs, came Friday and was a 4-0 shutout.
… They’re now 24-13-4, which is good for 52 points and second in the Central, thanks to the Blues’ surge under Hitchcock that put them in first with last night’s win over Colorado. Hitch can coach.
… The Hawks also lost Dan Carcillo to a 7-game suspension thanks to this. Carcillo hurt his knee on the play in a little bit of extra justice for being a piece of scum. He could be out for a while, which may mean the Wings won’t have to face him later in the season. I’m not complaining. He shouldn’t even be in the League.
… They’ll also be without Steve Montador and Marcus Kruger, per the game media notes.
… Presumably, Corey Crawford will be in net for this one.
… The Wings had a two-game win streak cut short by a loss in Toronto last night. With the loss, they blew a chance to position themselves for an ideal push for the Central lead today. As it is now, they’ll tie the Blues in points with a win over the Hawks and will get the tie breaker in wins to take first.
… I caught the first period of the game before switching over to the Lions. Obviously, I was less than impressed. They picked it up after that and came back to tie it up 3-3, but they’re going to have to be sure the team that came back is the one that shows up tonight, and not the team that went down 3-0 in the first 12 minutes of the game. The Blackhawks will destroy them if they come out like they did last night.
… No word on any lineup changes yet, but Tomas Holmstrom did say he would be back today, and Darren Helm was confident he’d be ready, too. And the loss may mean Babcock will switch Commodore back in for Kindl.
… Ty Conklin will start tonight.
… The Wings have a chance here, thanks to the Blackhawks’ skid, to take the lead in the Central and make it more about them and the Blues than them and the Hawks. Here’s hoping they take advantage.