Blues at Red Wings
Detroit Red Wings coach Mike Babcock has been preaching optimism despite seeing his team drop six of its last eight contests. The Red Wings will have to overcome a difficult obstacle to get back on track when they host the St. Louis Blues on Sunday afternoon. "The last three games were encouraging for me," Babcock told the Detroit Free Press after the Red Wings' 3-1 setback at Tampa Bay on Friday. "We've started to skate better. For a while there after the trip, we didn't skate at all, we couldn't move. It looks to me like our energy is back."
Detroit certainly needs to keep up its intensity as its lead over fourth-place Boston in the Atlantic Division has been trimmed to three points. While the Red Wings are opening a four-game homestand, St. Louis fell to 2-1-1 on its six-game road trip with a 6-3 setback to Minnesota on Saturday afternoon. The loss was the second straight for the Blues, who are even in points with Nashville atop the Central Division.
TV: 12 p.m. ET, NBC, RSN360
ABOUT THE BLUES (45-21-6): Paul Stastny was in no mood to celebrate despite scoring a goal for his 500th career point on Saturday. "I'd rather have it in a win, but you just keep going forward," Stastny said. "The only good news for us is we play (Sunday). We get right back at it." Vladimir Tarasenko collected a goal and an assist versus the Wild and also set up a tally in St. Louis' 3-2 overtime loss to Detroit on Jan. 15.
ABOUT THE RED WINGS (38-21-11): Pavel Datsyuk is questionable to play in Sunday's contest after sitting out the last two games with a lower-body injury. The dynamic Russian certainly made his mark in the teams' first meeting, scoring at 4:57 of overtime. Tomas Tatar also tallied in that game and scored his team's lone goal versus the Lightning.
OVERTIME
1. St. Louis LW Jaden Schwartz scored and set up a goal on Saturday but has yet to record a point in eight career meetings with Detroit.
2. Red Wings G Jimmy Howard has yielded 12 goals during his three-game losing streak.
3. Blues D Carl Gunnarsson suffered an upper-body injury on Saturday and is questionable to face Detroit.