Flames at Avalanche preview

FLAMES (15-12-4) at AVALANCHE (19-8-2)
9 p.m. ET; ESPN+, ALT, SNW, NHL.TV

Pavel Francouz will start for in goal Colorado with Grubauer day to day with a lower-body injury sustained in the first period against the Boston Bruins on Saturday. Makar is day to day with an upper-body injury sustained against the Bruins.
The Flames will try to extend their winning streak to five games and their point streak to seven games. They're 5-0-1 in their past six games after going 0-5-1 in the previous six.

Players to watch

Flames forward Sean Monahan has six points (three goals, three assists) during a five-game point streak.
Avalanche forward Nathan MacKinnon has 19 points (seven goals, 12 assists) in his past 10 games.

They said it

"I think we're playing a little bit faster. You can create speed through puck movement, you can create it through skating, you can create it by how good your gaps are. I think we've seen improvement in all three of those areas and as a result we're playing a little bit quicker." -- Flames coach Geoff Ward
"Different guys every night are stepping up and coming up with big plays and big goals, and the goalies have been playing really well. We're using our strength to our advantage, and that's playing with speed." -- Avalanche forward Gabriel Landeskog

Flames projected lineup

Matthew Tkachuk -- Elias Lindholm -- Andrew Mangiapane
Mikael Backlund -- Sean Monahan -- Dillon Dube
Milan Lucic -- Derek Ryan -- Johnny Gaudreau
Mark Jankowski -- Tobias Rieder -- Michael Frolik
Mark Giordano -- Rasmus Andersson
Noah Hanifin -- Travis Hamonic
TJ Brodie -- Oliver Kylington
David Rittich
Cam Talbot
Scratched:Zac Rinaldo, Michael Stone
Injured:Sam Bennett (upper body), Austin Czarnik (lower body)

Avalanche projected lineup

Gabriel Landeskog -- Nathan MacKinnon -- Mikko Rantanen
Andre Burakovsky -- J.T. Compher -- Joonas Donskoi
Matt Nieto -- Pierre-Edouard Bellemare -- Valeri Nichushkin
Vladislav Kamenev -- Tyson Jost -- Matt Calvert
Nikita Zadorov -- Samuel Girard
Ryan Graves -- Calle Rosen
Mark Barberio -- Ian Cole
Pavel Francouz
Adam Werner
Scratched: None
Injured: Philipp Grubauer (lower body), Erik Johnson (lower body), Nazem Kadri (lower body), Cale Makar (upper body), Colin Wilson (lower body)

Status report

Grubauer took part in the morning skate but Makar stayed off the ice. Werner was recalled from Colorado of the American Hockey League on Monday. To make room, forward
T.J. Tynan
was sent to the AHL.

Stat pack

Tkachuk has five points (one goal, four assists) in his past five games and needs one point for 200 in the NHL. … Dube has four points (two goals, two assists) during a three-game point streak. … Donskoi has seven points (three goals, four assists) in the past four games. … Rantanen has six points (one goal, five assists) in the past four games after missing the previous 16 with a lower-body injury.