Avalanche at Coyotes preview

AVALANCHE (16-15-3) at COYOTES (8-24-5)
8 p.m. ET; FS-A PLUS, ALT2, NHL.TV

The Avalanche, 4-2-1 in their past seven games after going 1-5-1 in their previous seven games, will have defenseman Erik Johnson back in the lineup following his two-game suspension for boarding Tampa Bay Lightning forward Vladislav Namestnikov in a 6-5 loss on Dec. 16.
The Coyotes ended a seven-game losing streak with a 3-2 overtime win against the Washington Capitals on Friday. Arizona is 2-8-2 in its past 12 games.

Players to watch

Avalanche forward Nathan MacKinnon has seven points (four goals, three assists) in a four-game point streak, and has 25 points (10 goals, 15 assists) in his past 18 games.
Coyotes forward Clayton Keller has five points (two goals, three assists) in a four-game point streak, including the winning goal in overtime on Friday.

They said it

"There's nothing worse than being out of the lineup and seeing the team struggle, so it was good to see them be so successful." -- Avalanche defenseman Erik Johnson on returning from a two-game suspension
"When I took the job I knew it was going to take some time to look for guys who were going to buy in, know what it takes to play and we're still trying to figure that out, but there's some good young guys that I think have gotten better. We're going to continue to harvest those guys." -- Coyotes coach Rick Tocchet

Avalanche projected lineup

Gabriel Landeskog -- Nathan MacKinnon -- Mikko Rantanen
Sven Andrighetto -- J.T. Compher -- Colin Wilson
Blake Comeau -- Carl Soderberg -- Matt Nieto
Tyson Jost -- Nail Yakupov
Nikita Zadorov -- Erik Johnson
Patrik Nemeth -- Tyson Barrie
Anton Lindholm -- Mark Barberio
Samuel Girard
Semyon Varlamov
Jonathan Bernier
Scratched: Gabriel Bourque
Injured:Vladislav Kamenev (arm)

Coyotes projected lineup

Anthony Duclair -- Derek Stepan -- Tobias Rieder
Clayton Keller -- Max Domi -- Christian Fischer
Zac Rinaldo -- Christian Dvorak -- Josh Archibald
Jordan Martinook -- Brad Richardson -- Nick Cousins
Oliver Ekman-Larsson -- Jason Demers
Jakob Chychrun -- Alex Goligoski
Kevin Connauton -- Luke Schenn
Antti Raanta
Scott Wedgewood
Scratched:Andrew Campbell, Brendan Perlini
Injured: Niklas Hjalmarsson (upper body)

Status report

Duclair will play after being a healthy scratch the past two games. He has been a healthy scratch 10 times this season. … The Coyotes recalled Campbell from Tucson of the American Hockey League and re-assigned forward Nick Merkley and defenseman Joel Hanley to Tucson.

Stat pack

Landeskog has seven points (four goals, three assists) in a three-game point streak. … Rantanen has six points (one goal, five assists) in a five-game point streak, his longest in the NHL. … Varlamov is 2-0-1 with five goals allowed in his past three starts after going 1-3-0 with 14 goals allowed in his previous four starts. … Colorado's penalty kill is 18-for-18 in its past seven games. … The Coyotes have the best penalty kill in the NHL since Oct. 31 (89.6 percent; 60-for-67 in 24 games).