The Colorado Avalanche have one more home game before they quickly turn around and head back on the road. This time they face an all-too-familiar opponent: the Nashville Predators. This will be the third meeting between these two teams in the regular season, with Nashville winning the first game and Colorado winning the second game.

Colorado avalanche

After a really successful road trip where they won four of five away games, Colorado returned home to face the Utah Hockey Club on Thursday night and ultimately lost 4-1. Now they can bounce back here tonight against the Nashville Predators.

It was fascinating to see where these two teams are at this point in the season. While both struggled early in the year, Colorado managed to turn around that difficult start and put itself in position to compete with the division’s top teams. On the other hand, Nashville has struggled with a similar start to the season and has been unable to turn things around so far this season. Hopefully Colorado can take advantage of this struggling Predators team tonight and bring home two more points.

Projected lines

Artturi Lehkonen – Nathan MacKinnon – Mikko Rantanen
Ross Colton – Casey Mittelstadt – Valeri Nichushkin
Joel Kiviranta – Parker Kelly – Logan O’Connor
Givani Smith – Ivan Ivan – Chris Wagner

Devon Toews – Cale Makar
Samuel Girard-Sam Malinski
Keaton Middleton-Calvin De Haan

Nashville Predators

As mentioned, it’s not exactly a secret that this Nashville team has struggled all season so far. After an offseason that saw them sign three of the biggest names available in Steven Stamkos, Brady Skjei and Jonathan Marchessault, the results so far this season have arguably been disappointing.

However, they pulled off a big 4-1 win against the Dallas Stars, which ended their previous five-game losing streak. Despite their struggles, they have some incredible, elite talent on their team that Colorado will need to look out for in this game tonight.

Projected lines

Filip Forsberg – Steven Stamkos – Jonathan Marchessault
Zachary L’Heureux – Ryan O’Reilly – Gustav Nyquist
Mark Jankowski – Tommy Novak – Luke Evangelista
Cole Smith – Michael McCarron – Colton Sissons

Brady Skjei – Nick Blankenburg
Marc Del Gaizo – Luke Schenn
Kevin Gravel-Adam Wilsby

goalkeeper

After Scott Wedgewood made three straight starts, we’ll likely see Mackenzie Blackwood in net for the Avs tonight, assuming he isn’t still sick, of course. If he’s still sick, Wedgewood will be back in net for Colorado. For the Predators, it will likely be Juuse Saros in net against Blackwood, as Justus Annunen got the start in the game against the Dallas Stars.