Pens host Wild
The Pittsburgh Penguins host the Minnesota Wild tonight in the second of a two part series this season. The Penguins were boosted slightly by the news that Comeau and Hornqvist would be a few weeks which is a shorter time span than originally feared. There was bad news though in that Olli Maatta may miss the rest of the season due to a recurring shoulder issue which originally was thought to have been fixed with off-season surgery.
The Penguins made a change before today's game calling up Taylor Chorney from Wilkes-Barre Scranton and sending down Derrick Pouliot. Kris Letang is expected to be fit to go for tonight so Chorney has been brought up as the extra body rather than waste Pouliot's time and development by sitting him in the press box. Marc-Andre Fleury is the starter for tonight and he has a poor record against the Wild; 0-5-0 with a 0.853% SV and a 3.76 GAA. On the bright side though he is yet to allow a PP or SH goal.
The Wild come into this having lost 5 consecutive games and are really struggling to score at the same time and are currently last place in the Central with an 18-18-5 record. The Wild's record against the Metropolitan division is also poor at 2-5-0. One of the biggest problems that the Wild are facing is that they are in need of a goaltender. Darcy Kuemper has been out for a week and Josh Harding is battling his multiple-sclerosis diagnosis.
I'm hoping that tonight Johnston puts Perron back on Crosby's LW where he is much more suited than Chris Kunitz. Kunitz has really struggled this season and is evident in his play. I would like to see Bennett also alongside Crosby on the RW but I think that the success of him with Malkin would mean we won't see that, he absolutely needs to see more PP time though. The Pens lines I would expect to see are below;
Chris Kunitz - Sidney Crosby - David Perron
Nick Spaling - Evgeni Malkin - Beau Bennett
Bryan Rust - Brandon Sutter - Steve Downie
Zach Sill - Marcel Goc - Craig Adams
Kris Letang - Simon Despres
Christian Ehrhoff - Paul Martin
Rob Scuderi - Robert Bortuzzo
My prediction for this game would be a 4-2 Pens win. Lets go Pens!
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