Avalanche at Golden Knights preview

AVALANCHE (7-1-1) at GOLDEN KNIGHTS (7-4-0)
6 p.m. ET; ESPN+, ATTSN-RM, ALT2, NHL.TV

Rantanen, who is tied with linemate Nathan MacKinnon for the most points on the Avalanche with 12 (five goals, seven assists), is week to week after sustaining a lower-body injury in a 3-1 loss to the St. Louis Blues on Monday.
MacKinnon has five goals and seven assists in a season-opening nine-game point streak.
Marc-Andre Fleury is expected to start for Vegas, which has won five of its past seven games and is back home after going 2-1-0 on a three-game road trip.

Players to watch

Avalanche forward J.T. Compher, who has four points (one goal, three assists) in six games this season, will replace Rantanen on the top line.
Golden Knights forward Mark Stone has eight points (four goals, four assists) during a seven-game point streak.

They said it

"When I'm playing well, I'm playing with speed and playing hard. I think I can bring that to this line. They already play with a ton of speed, so I'm hoping to complement them as best I can."-- Avalanche forward J.T. Compher
"Make them play defense, make them turn around. When we're successful, I think we get the puck deep behind them and we grind and play a heavy game. If it doesn't work right away, we've got to stick to that game plan." -- Golden Knights center Paul Stastny on slowing down the Avalanche

Avalanche projected lineup

Gabriel Landeskog -- Nathan MacKinnon -- J.T. Compher
Joonas Donskoi -- Nazem Kadri -- Andre Burakovsky
Colin Wilson -- Tyson Jost -- Valeri Nichushkin
Matt Nieto -- Pierre-Edouard Bellemare -- Matt Calvert
Samuel Girard -- Erik Johnson
Ian Cole -- Cale Makar
Ryan Graves -- Nikita Zadorov
Philipp Grubauer
Pavel Francouz
Scratched:Mark Barberio, Vladislav Kamenev
Injured: Mikko Rantanen (lower body)

Golden Knights projected lineup

Jonathan Marchessault -- William Karlsson -- Reilly Smith
Max Pacioretty -- Paul Stastny -- Mark Stone
Brandon Pirri -- Cody Eakin -- Cody Glass
William Carrier -- Tomas Nosek -- Ryan Reaves
Brayden McNabb -- Shea Theodore
Jon Merrill -- Nick Holden
Jake Bischoff -- Deryk Engelland
Marc-Andre Fleury
Garret Sparks
Scratched:Nicolas Hague, Nicolas Roy
Injured: Nate Schmidt (lower body), Alex Tuch (upper body), Malcolm Subban (lower body)
Suspended: Valentin Zykov

Status report

Bellemare will play against the Golden Knights for the first time since signing with the Avalanche as a free agent July 1. He spent the previous two seasons with Vegas … Makar and Zadorov will be split after playing the first nine games together. … Sparks was recalled from Chicago of the American Hockey League on Wednesday after
Oscar Dansk
was reassigned.

Stat pack

Fleury is 3-0-0 with a 0.95 goals-against average, a .970 save percentage and one shutout in his past three starts. … Grubauer is 2-1-1 with a 3.17 GAA and .902 save percentage in his past four starts.