Minnesota Wild @ Anaheim Ducks:

by nathaneide on Dec 14, 2008 6:30 PM CST

Minnesota Wild at Anaheim Ducks, Dec 14, 2008 7:00 PM CST

Minnesotawild_medium

Minnesota Wild (15-12-1) @ Anaheim Ducks (16-11-3)

Honda Center @ 7:00 CST

Television: FSN
Listen live on WCCO.com, or locally at 830 AM

For the Ducks perspective, check out Battle of California

Tonight's lines:

Minnesota Wild

Anaheim Ducks

Veilleux - Koivu - Mittens
Brunette - Gillies - Bouchard
Burns - Sheppard - Gilles
Weller - Pouliot - Boogaard

Johnsson - Schultz
Zidlicky - Skoula
Reitz - Bergeron

Backstrom
Harding

Ryan - Getzlaf - Perry
Kunitz - Morrison - Selanne
Moen - Pahlsson - Niedermayer
May - Marchant - Parros

Pronger - Huskins
Niedermayer - Festerling
Hedican - Montador

Giguere
Hiller

Minnesota Wild Injuries

Questionable

Player	Injury Type	Injury Date
Owen Nolan	right leg	12.14.2008

Out (IR / Out / Suspended / Physically unvailable)

Player	Injury Type	Injury Date
Marian Gaborik	lower body	10.15.2008
Kurtis Foster	left leg surgery	9.20.2008

Anaheim Ducks Injuries

Questionable

Player	Injury Type	Injury Date
Brad May	right knee	12.14.2008

Out (IR / Out / Suspended / Physically unvailable)

Player	Injury Type	Injury Date
Francois Beauchemin	left knee surgery	11.15.2008
Brad Larsen	sports hernia surgery	10.9.2008

Notes

The Wild have dropped four in a row in regulation for the first time since Nov. 20-28, 2003.
The Wild are 4th in the NHL on the power play, (24.4%), but are last in the NHL with 40 even-strength goals in 28 games.
The Wild are 1-for-14 in those situations over the last four contests.
Minnesota is 9-4-0 in the series since March 28, 2004
The Ducks are just 3-for-22 over their last seven games

From Russo's Rants

The Wild, let’s just say, they’re not very good right now. I really, really hope all the Wild fans in the crowd today didn’t actually spend money on plane tickets to come out here and see today’s performance.

Regardless of the reason for the Wild’s terrible effort early in this game, what’s more frightening is nobody in the locker room I interviewed would admit to it. I am not kidding you, other than Antti Miettinen, five of the six players I interviewed all felt the team’s start tonight was fine and it played well in the first and second periods.

Sure. I guess it was deceiving when the Wild was being outshot 40-20 at one point.

Questions to Answer

Will the offense wake the hell up?
With Brian Burke gone, is Anaheim still the evil center of hockey
Will Andrew Brunette
Who, aside from Kopitar, will impress the Wild enough to be considered a target for the Gaborik trade?
Will O'Sullivan get payback?

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