Sharks at Panthers preview

SHARKS (13-8-2) at PANTHERS (10-12-2)
7:30 p.m. ET; FS-F, NBCSCA, NHL.TV

Dell made 22 saves in a 3-1 victory against the Philadelphia Flyers on Tuesday. He started ahead of Martin Jones, who was out because of an undisclosed injury. Jones will back up Dell against the Panthers and could start against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday.
The Panthers expect to have forward Radim Vrbata back in the lineup. He has missed five games since being hit in the face by a puck 12 seconds into his first shift against the Los Angeles Kings on Nov. 18. He was activated off injured reserve Thursday.

Players to watch

Sharks forward Joe Pavelski is one goal away from becoming the 18th United States-born NHL player with 300.
Panthers goaltender Roberto Luongo is 5-2-0 with a 1.97 goals-against average and a .941 save percentage in his past seven games.

They said it

"I just told our guys today, there's no way we can go 0-2 against these guys and me listen to that all summer. This is a big one for us." -- Sharks coach Peter DeBoer on his second game against Panthers coach Bob Boughner, a former Sharks assistant under DeBoer
"We're starting to figure it out a little bit. We're getting contributions throughout the lineup. It's not just the big guys scoring. We're getting some young guys helping with the secondary scoring." -- Panthers coach Bob Boughner

Sharks projected lineup

Timo Meier -- Joe Thornton -- Joe Pavelski
Kevin Labanc -- Logan Couture -- Tomas Hertl
Jannik Hansen -- Chris Tierney -- Mikkel Boedker
Melker Karlsson -- Ryan Carpenter -- Joel Ward
Marc-Edouard Vlasic -- Justin Braun
Brenden Dillon -- Brent Burns
Tim Heed -- Dylan DeMelo
Aaron Dell
Martin Jones
Scratched:Danny O'Regan](https://www.nhl.com/player/daniel-o-regan-8476982?season=20172018), Joakim Ryan
Injured: Joonas Donskoi](https://www.nhl.com/player/joonas-donskoi-8475820?season=20172018) (lower body), Paul Martin (ankle), Barclay Goodrow (upper body)

Panthers projected lineup

Jonathan Huberdeau -- Aleksander Barkov --
Denis Malgin
Jamie McGinn -- Vincent Trocheck -- Nick Bjugstad
Henrik Haapala
-- Jared McCann -- Radim Vrbata
Micheal Haley - Derek MacKenzie -- Colton Sceviour
Keith Yandle -- Aaron Ekblad
Mike Matheson -- MacKenzie Weegar
Mark Pysyk -- Alexander Petrovic
Roberto Luongo
James Reimer
Scratched:Connor Brickley, Ian McCoshen, Dryden Hunt
Injured: Evgenii Dadonov](https://www.nhl.com/player/evgenii-dadonov-8474149?season=20172018) (upper body)

Status report

Goalie
Antoine Bibeau
, who was Dell's backup Tuesday, was sent to San Jose, the Sharks' American Hockey League affiliate, on Thursday. DeBoer said Donskoi was day-to-day. He left the game Tuesday with 7:02 remaining in the second period. … Dadonov was placed on injured reserve Thursday. He is expected to miss 4-6 weeks after being injured against the Chicago Blackhawks on Saturday. MacKenzie will be in the lineup after sitting out practice Thursday.

Stat pack

Braun is one of seven NHL players this season to have at least 50 hits and 50 blocked shots. Burns has 16 points (six goals, 10 assists) in 16 career games against the Panthers. … The Panthers are 9-for-9 on the penalty kill in its past four games. Barkov leads all NHL forwards in average time on ice at 22:34 per game.