Penguins @ Coyotes Game Preview

VS. 

Game Time: 10pm/ET
From: Jobing.com Arena, Phoenix, AZ
Penguins Record: 5-3-2 (7th in Eastern Conference)
Coyotes Record: 3-4-0 (14th in Western Conference)

Last Meeting: Dec 3rd, 2007 @ Pittsburgh (3-1 PIT) [link]


PENGUINS LINES:
Pascal Dupuis - Sidney Crosby - Ruslan Fedetenko
Matt Cooke - Evgeni Malkin - Petr Sykora

Tyler Kennedy - Jordan Staal - Miroslav Satan

Paul Bissonnette - Mike Zigomanis - Eric Godard

Brooks Orpik - Rob Scuderi
Mark Eaton - Kris Letang
Darryl Sydor - Alex Goligoski

Marc- Andre Fleury (4-2-2 / 2.17GAA / .933 SV%)

COYOTES LINES:

Todd Fedoruk - Olli Jokinen - Shane Doan

Daniel Carcillo - Martin Hanzal - Peter Mueller

Kevin Porter - Steven Reinprecht - Mikkel Boedker

Daniel Winnik - Kyle Turris - Viktor Tikhonov

Ilya Bryzgalov (2-3-0 / 3.41GAA / .889 SV%)

Apparently Coach Gretzky is unsure of his defensive pairings now that the team has added Ken Klee to their lineup.

PENGUINS LEADERS:

GOALS: Satan (4)

ASSISTS: Malkin (12)

POINTS: Malkin (15)

+/-: Malkin (+4)


COYOTES LEADERS:

GOALS: Doan (4)

ASSISTS: Jokinen (6)

POINTS: Jokinen (7)

+/-: Reinprecht (+3)

This is a game that the Penguins need to not only win, but to win convincingly.  After a terrible game against in San Jose all that could be said was that the Sharks are a very good team, so the loss should hurt less.  The same is not true for the Coyotes.  The Pens have switched up their lines for this game, splitting up Malkin and Crosby, in an attempt to spread out the offense more.  I believe it will work.

Fleury has been outstanding in net thus far so I see the goaltending edge going to the Penguins.

The Pens penalty killing is 5th in the league and their powerplay is ranked 8th.
The Coyotes penatly killing is 22nd in the league and their power play is 26th.

NHL GameCenter appears to be offering a free preview today, so for those outside of Pittsburgh or Phoenix, this might be a good option for catching the game online.

Prediction: 4-1 Pens