Who: Toronto Maple Leafs (25-19-5, 55pts, 9th) at Pittsburgh Penguins (28-17-4, 60pts, 5th)
What: Game #50 of the 2011-12 Season
Where: Consol Energy Arena in downtown Pittsburgh, PA
When: 7:00pm Eastern, TSN (CAN), ROOT (Pittsburgh local), totally non-illegal streams
Why: With a win tonight and some fortunate losses of other contending teams, the Leafs have a shot to move up to 7th in the Eastern Conference.
Take the jump for some notes on the upcoming game and expected starting rosters.
Despite their recoveries coming along nicely, it doesn't look like either of John-Michael Liles or Colby Armstrong will play tonight; instead look for them to re-debut tomorrow on the tail end of another bizarre back-to-back home-and-home. (My inside sources tells me he's 97% sure Reimer starts tomorrow.) So that means the same lineup tonight as we saw last Tuesday on Long Island; including Jonas Gustavsson in net.
Leafs expected lineup:
Lupul-Bozak-Kessel
Kulemin-Grabovski-MacArthur
Lombardi-Connolly-Kadri
Brown-Steckel-Crabb
Phaneuf-Schenn
Gunnarsson-Komisarek
Gardiner-Franson-Aulie (no idea who's sitting)
Gustavsson
Reimer
Penguins expected lineup:
Malkin-Whocares-Don'tcare
Whocares-Don'tcare-Nobody
Nobody-Somebody-Cooke
Plugger-Plugger-SomeguyfromWilkesBarrie
Letang-Martin
D3-D4
D5-D6
Fleury
Brent 'KO' Johnson
Seriously, tonight is all about shutting down Evgeni Malkin who's currently playing his way to another Hart Trophy winning season. He's gone full on beast mode, and Wilson will have a hard time matching lines against him (even though he doesn't do that) with Bylsma getting last change this evening.
Tonight's a big one. Hope the Leafs don't fall flat on their faces. As always GO LEAFS GO!
