Avalanche at Stars
THE STORY: With a sputtering offense, the Colorado Avalanche do not have the luxury of being able to squander two-goal leads. Unfortunately for Joe Sacco's charges, that's exactly what they did on Thursday when their offense took the rest of the night off during their 3-2 overtime loss to the Nashville Predators. "We were on our heels instead of being on our toes," Avalanche goaltender Jean-Sebastien Giguere said. The not-so-fancy footwork sent Colorado to its third loss in a row (0-2-1) after winning nine of its previous 10 games. The Avalanche will look to get it together on Saturday when they travel to American Airlines Center to face the Dallas Stars. Colorado currently sits in 10th place in the ultra-competitive Western Conference standings - one point behind Dallas. For their part, the Stars won for the third time in four games on Thursday with a 5-4 shootout victory over the Pacific Division rival Los Angeles Kings.
TV: 3 p.m. ET, NHLN, ALT
ABOUT THE AVALANCHE (23-20-2): Peter Mueller returned to the ice on Thursday for the first time since Oct. 12 and registered five shots on goal and logged 13:10 of ice time. "I thought for his first game back, he played well," Sacco said. "He was around the puck, especially in the offensive zone. He did a good job managing his shifts and making sure not to get caught out there too long." Mueller played in three games this season before experiencing more symptoms from the concussion that sidelined him all of last season.
ABOUT THE STARS (24-17-1): Loui Eriksson tallied twice in regulation and netted the lone goal in the shootout to lift Dallas to victory Thursday. Eriksson has collected 10 goals in his last six games. Dallas coach Glen Gulutzan spent most of Friday giving medical updates on his players. Gulutzan noted that C Mike Ribeiro will miss his third straight game on Saturday with a knee injury while G Kari Lehtonen is nursing a bruise on his tailbone. The Finn is expected to play on Saturday.
OVERTIME:
1. Avalanche G Semyon Varlamov is expected to start Saturday's contest despite sitting out Thursday's tilt after taking a puck to the knee during practice.
2. Dallas has collected 17 of a possible 22 points (8-2-1) in its last 11 home games versus Colorado.
PREDICTION: Stars 4, Avalanche 1.