At the Rink: Avalanche at Oilers

AVALANCHE (33-27-12) at OILERS (20-40-13)

TV: SN, ALT2

EDMONTON - Defenseman Andrew Ference and center Boyd Gordon will not be in the lineup for the Edmonton Oilers against the Colorado Avalanche at Rexall Place on Wednesday.

Ference sustained a concussion in a 4-1 loss against the Winnipeg Jets on Monday. The Oilers' captain was hit by Jets forward Chris Thorburn in the first period, left the game and didn't return. He'll be replaced by Keith Aulie.

Gordon is out with a back injury, also sustained in the loss to Winnipeg. Luke Gazdic, who has missed the past three games with an illness, will replace Gordon.

Neither team held a morning skate.

Colorado (33-27-12) is 10 points behind the Winnipeg Jets for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference with 10 games to play. The Avalanche have lost two straight but have seven wins in their past 11 games.

Edmonton (20-40-13) has two wins in its past 11 games and has been eliminated from playoff contention for the ninth consecutive season.

Goaltender Ben Scrivens will make his eighth consecutive start for Edmonton. Semyon Varlamov has started the past five games for Colorado and will play against the Oilers.

Here are the projected lineups:

AVALANCHE

John Mitchell - Matt Duchene - Jarome Iginla

Gabriel Landeskog - Ryan O'Reilly - Alex Tanguay

Cody McLeod - Marc-Andre Cliche - Dennis Everberg

Jordan Caron - Freddie Hamilton - Daniel Briere

Nate Guenin - Tyson Barrie

Jan Hejda - Zach Redmond

Brad Stuart - Nick Holden

Semyon Varlamov

Reto Berra

Scratched: Joey Hishon

Injured: Jesse Winchester (head), Jamie McGinn (back), Erik Johnson (knee), Ryan Wilson (shoulder), Nathan MacKinnon (foot), Borna Rendulic (leg), Patrick Bordeleau (knee)

OILERS

Benoit Pouliot - Ryan Nugent-Hopkins - Jordan Eberle

Teddy Purcell - Derek Roy – Nail Yakupov

Taylor Hall – Anton Lander – Andrew Miller

Luke Gazdic - Matt Hendricks – Rob Klinkhammer

Oscar Klefbom - Justin Schultz

Martin Marincin - Mark Fayne

Nikita Nikitin – Keith Aulie

Ben Scrivens

Richard Bachman

Scratched: Matt Fraser

Injured: Tyler Pitlick (lacerated spleen), Viktor Fasth (knee), Iiro Pakarinen (knee), Andrew Ference (upper body). Boyd Gordon (back)

Status report: Hall will play his third game since returning from a leg injury. He has two assists in two games after missing 23 of the past 24 games … Aulie returns to the lineup after being a healthy scratch in each of the past two games.

Who's hot: Nugent-Hopkins is on a six-game point streak with four goals and seven assists … Duchene has a goal and three assists in his past five games … O'Reilly has three goals and three assists in his past four games.