The start of a final regular season California back-to-back.
With two games left in the regular season, there’s nothing to play for as the Colorado Avalanche are essentially locked into the third seed likely facing the Dallas Stars in the first round of the playoffs. Still, the squad will be in search of a better effort than they managed on Thursday night in the 4-1 loss to the Vancouver Canucks. This trip is the final road journey in the 2024-25 regular season and Colorado will do it in back-to-back fashion with LA today and Anaheim tomorrow night.
Colorado Avalanche
It’s officially rest up until the playoffs mode for the Avalanche who have left Nathan MacKinnon, Cale Makar, Ross Colton, Jonathan Drouin, Josh Manson Devon Toews and Ryan Lindgren back home not joining the trip to California. They are all considered banged up and day-to-day with minor injuries, we’ll see what next week’s practice brings.
To compensate for the missing bodies the Avalanche called up forward Jere Innala and two defensemen who haven’t dressed for the team yet in Wyatt Aamodt and Jack Achan. Without a morning skate heading into the matinee, we can only guess at the lineup. This would be Aamodt’s NHL debut if the 27-year old gets to play. Girard will have to hold the fort down with quite a few fill-ins on the back end.
Projected Lineup
Nichushkin – Nelson – Necas
Wood – Coyle – Lehkonen
Vesey – Drury – O’Connor
Innala – Wagner – Kelly
Girard – Malinski
Middleton – Johnson
Aamodt – Achan
LA Kings
The Kings have a little more to play for as they hope to hold on to the second seed in the pacific division but are also entering rest mode with playoffs on the horizon. Defensemen Drew Doughty and Joel Edmundson are unlikely to play which is setting up quite the defensive showcase between these two teams. The Kings had a strong 6-1 win over Anaheim on Thursday night and hope to keep that momentum going.
Projected Lineup
Kuzmenko – Kopitar – Kempe
Foegele – Danault – Moore
Fiala – Byfield – Laferriere
Malott – Helenius – Lewis
Anderson – Clarke
Gavrikov – Spence
Moverare – Burroughs
Goaltenders
With the back-to-back it’s pretty logical the Avalanche are going to split their netminders this weekend. With Mackenzie Blackwood taking the crease in the last outing I’d hedge to Scott Wedgewood getting this start. Darcy Kuemper sat out LA’s last meeting with Colorado, with this game I’d expect him to get the start as the Kings hope to finish strong.