Pregame: Red Wings @ Wild – 4/4

Hey, we’re back. That hiatus DH.N has been on? We’re gonna pretend that’s over and see if we can’t get back to talking about some hockey over here, as the Red Wings visit the Minnesota Wild tonight.

Also back? Jimmy Howard and Pavel Datsyuk. Howard gets the start in goal after Petr Mrazek had gotten the nod for a few games. Datsyuk returns from a troublesome ankle to center Darren Helm and Tomas Tatar.

Daniel Cleary will be the healthy scratch up front with Erik Cole and Tomas Jurco still injured (and Johan Franzen on IR with no return in sight). Jakub Kindl is the healthy scratch on defense. Mrazek will back up Howard with Jonas Gustavsson (remember him?) still shelved.

The Wild are playoff-bound, riding the improbably-hot netminding of Devan Dubnyk. The Red Wings chased Dubnyk when the two teams met on January 20 but still needed a shootout to get the win after the Wild scored three third-period goals to force overtime. Three third-period goals against… This sounds familiar…

Stupid stat of the day: The Red Wings are 89-83-20 all-time in the regular season in April.

Game time is 7:00 PM on FSD+.