Open Thread: Colorado Avalanche vs. Toronto Maple Leafs (8:00 p.m. MT)

After securing a shutout against the Columbus Blue Jackets this past Saturday, the Colorado Avalanche welcome the Toronto Maple Leafs to town. This will be the first of two regular-season matchups between these two teams.

Colorado Avalanche (33-4-7)

The Avs continued their dominance at home to start this home-stand, winning 8-2 over the Ottawa Senators and 4-0 over the Blue Jackets to extend their home win streak to 17 games. Tonight, they’ll look to keep that streak alive against a surging Maple Leafs team, who suddenly find themselves just one point out of a playoff soot after being dead last in the NHL for a good bit.

Projected Lineup

Artturi Lehkonen – Nathan MacKinnon – Martin Necas
Ross Colton – Brock Nelson – Valeri Nichushkin
Parker Kelly – Jack Drury – Victor Olofsson
Zakhar Bardakov – Ivan Ivan – Gavin Brindley

Sam Malinski – Cale Makar
Josh Manson – Brent Burns
Samuel Girard – Ilya Solovyov

Trent Miner
Scott Wedgewood

Toronto Maple Leafs (22-15-7)

Despite a less-than-ideal, to say the least, start to the season, the Leafs have fought all the way back from being at the bottom of the league, and now find themselves just one point out of a wild card spot, as previously mentioned. While this team has had a fall from grace this year, this is still a very good Maple Leafs team that can definitely score, and Colorado will have to mind that here tonight.

Projected Lineup

Matthew Knies – Auston Matthews – Max Domi
Matias Maccelli – John Tavares – William Nylander
Easton Cowan – Nicolas Roy – Nicholas Robertson
Steven Lorentz – Scott Laughton – Bobby McMann

Morgan Rielly – Brandon Carlo
Jake McCabe – Oliver Ekman-Larsson
Simon Benoit – Troy Stetcher

Joseph Woll
Dennis Hildeby

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