After the Ottawa Senators swept their home-and-home series to start the month, one would imagine that the Detroit Red Wings have a bit of a chip on their shoulder. Detroit hasn’t lost in regulation since those back-to-back losses against the Sens, and Ottawa has lost three of four since then.

Based on Ottawa’s lines at the morning skate, Michael Del Zotto will replace Victor Mete, and head coach DJ Smith considers Drake Batherson a game-time decision. It also looks like the trend will continue with Anton Forsberg starting this road game:

Morning skate lines from Detroit

Tkachuk Norris Joseph
Formenton Stützle Batherson
Kelly White Brown
Gaudette Gambrell Watson

Brannstrom Zub
Del Zotto Hamonic
Holden Zaitsev

Forsberg-starters end.
Sogaard

— TSN 1200 (@TSN1200) April 12, 2022

Thomas Greiss likely starts for Detroit, and the Red Wings ran these lines and pairings at practice yesterday:

#RedWings lines at practice:
Bertuzzi-Larkin-Raymond
Vrana-Suter-Zadina
Sundqvist-Veleno-Rasmussen
Erne-Stephens-Gagner
DeKeyser-Seider
Staal-Hronek
Walman-Lindstrom
Juolevi-Oesterle pic.twitter.com/TqazktzgqD

— Ansar Khan (@AnsarKhanMLive) April 11, 2022

Game Notes

• Since the trade deadline specifically, Greiss has outperformed Alex Nedeljkovic with a 91.6 save percentage (over that same span Forsberg has a save percentage of 91.1 so we should get a surprisingly close matchup in net).
• The usual suspects have driven Detroit’s offence over the same span with Jakub Vrana and Dylan Larkin averaging about a point-per-game each since the deadline. For the Sens, you already know the Mathieu Joseph, Brady Tkachuk, and Josh Norris have led the way the past three weeks.
• At a team level, the Sens and Wings have followed similar trajectories since the deadline with nine points each in ten games played (including those two head-to-head).
• Since reconfiguring their defence, Ottawa has moved near the top ten in penalty kill shot suppression (5.76 xGA/60) while Detroit remains in the bottom ten league wide (10.47 xGA/60). Both teams have looked better on the powerplay in terms of generating offence with Ottawa (and some healthy forwards) in the top five (9.02 xGF/60) and Detroit in the middle of the pack (7.23 xGF/60).
• At five-on-five, both teams still struggle but Ottawa has cleaned up their defence over the past ten games to get closer to average (48.99 CF% 5V5) and Detroit ranks closer to the bottom league-wide (47.73 CF% 5V%)./

Where to watch/listen: TSN5, RDS, TSN1200 @730PM EST

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