Zucker - Staal - Granlund
Parise - Koivu - Niederreiter
Ennis - Cullen - Coyle
Foligno - Eriksson-Ek - Winnik
Suter - Spurgeon
Brodin - Dumba
Seeler - Prosser
Dubnyk
Landeskog - MacKinnon - Rantanen
Nieto - Soderberg - Comeau
Jost - Compher - Andrighetto
Bourque - Kerfoot - Yakupov
Zadorov - Barrie
Nemeth - Girard
Siemens - Warsofsky
Varlamov
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The Opponent
The Colorado Avalanche won 5-2 against Arizona on Saturday, snapping a three-game losing streak in the process. But that doesn't mean Colorado hasn't been productive lately; it's earned at least one point in every game this month (2-0-3), in seven straight games and in nine of 10 games overall.
Tuesday's game is the first of three straight inside the Central Division for the Avs, who play at St. Louis on Thursday in a huge game before returning home to host Nashville on Friday.
The Avalanche have won two of the three meetings so far this season, scoring 7-2 and 7-1 wins on home ice. Minnesota won 3-2 in a shootout the day after Thanksgiving in the only other game played between the rivals at Xcel Energy Center.
Nathan MacKinnon leads Colorado with eight points, including three goals and five assists, in the three games against the Wild. Mikko Rantanen has seven points.
MacKinnon has a team-leading 32 goals and 81 points this season. Rantanen is second with 23 goals and 69 points. Avs captain Gabriel Landeskog has scored 22 goals.
Goaltender Semyon Varlamov is the expected starter. He is 18-13-6 in 38 starts this season, posting a 2.85 goals-against average and a .913 save percentage. He made 31 saves in the 7-1 win against Minnesota on March 2.
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I'm not sure of the exact implications in the standings, but the Avalanche are close enough that this is still a pretty big game. The proverbial "4 point game" when Colorado's only 5 points back with a game in hand. It's pretty easy to let the game in Edmonton roll off my back, but we need to take care of business at home.
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