Stars at Oilers preview

STARS (40-31-6) at OILERS (34-34-8)
9 p.m. ET; SNW, FS-SW+, NHL.TV

The Stars are three points ahead of the Colorado Avalanche and play the second of a back to back after defeating the Calgary Flames 2-1 on Wednesday.
Goalie Anton Khudobin starts for Dallas. Goalie Ben Bishop is day to day with a lower-body injury sustained in the second period against Calgary.
The Oilers are seven points behind the Avalanche for the second wild card with six games remaining.

Players to watch

Stars forward Alexander Radulov has 18 points (10 goals, eight assists) in his past 16 games.
Oilers center Connor McDavid has 112 points (39 goals, 73 assists), the most by an Edmonton player since Mark Messier had 129 (45 goals, 84 assists) in 1989-90.

They said it

"You know they're going to be loose, they're going to play probably a little more risk in their game than we are going to, at least I hope, we are going to. That lends to creativity and it makes it harder to defend." -- Stars coach Jim Montgomery on the Oilers
"They're a team that works really hard and are playing really good hockey right now. They beat a couple of good teams on the road and it's going to be a big challenge for us and we have to be ready to go right off the bat." -- Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse

Stars projected lineup

Jamie Benn -- Tyler Seguin -- Jason Dickinson
Mattias Janmark -- Roope Hintz -- Alexander Radulov
Andrew Cogliano -- Radek Faksa -- Blake Comeau
Valeri Nichushkin -- Joel L'Esperance -- Brett Ritchie
Esa Lindell -- John Klingberg
Miro Heiskanen -- Roman Polak
Taylor Fedun -- Ben Lovejoy
Anton Khudobin
Landon Bow
Scratched:Julius Honka, Jason Spezza, Jamie Oleksiak
Injured:Stephen Johns (upper body), Marc Methot (lower body), Martin Hanzal (back), Tyler Pitlick (upper body), Mats Zuccarello (arm), Justin Dowling (upper body), Ben Bishop (lower body)

Oilers projected lineup

Leon Draisaitl -- Connor McDavid -- Zack Kassian
Joseph Gambardella -- Ryan Nugent-Hopkins -- Alex Chiasson
Tobias Rieder -- Colby Cave -- Sam Gagner
Milan Lucic -- Kyle Brodziak -- Josh Currie
Oscar Klefbom -- Adam Larsson
Darnell Nurse -- Kris Russell
Andrej Sekera -- Matt Benning
Mikko Koskinen
Anthony Stolarz
Scratched:Kevin Gravel, Ty Rattie, Alexander Petrovic, Brad Malone
Injured:Jesse Puljujarvi (lower body), Jujhar Khaira (foot)

Status report

The Stars recalled Bow from the Texas of the American Hockey League. … Dowling is day to day after he was injured Wednesday. … Dallas did not hold in a morning skate … Khaira skated with the Oilers but will not play.

Stat pack

Seguin has nine points (four goals, five assists) in a five-game point streak and 14 (four goals, 10 assists) in his past 11 games … Draisaitl has scored 46 goals, most by an Oiler since Jimmy Carson (49) in 1988-89.