Wild Warmup: Minnesota at Chicago

The Essentials

The Opponent

The Chicago Blackhawks are coming off their most lopsided loss of the season, a 6-0 defeat at the hands of the Montreal Canadiens on Friday night. Prior to the loss, Chicago had been riding a four-game winning streak, all at the United Center. The Hawks' four regulation losses on home ice this season are tied with Minnesota for fewest in the Western Conference and second-fewest in the NHL.

Connections

• Wild coach Bruce Boudreau played in seven games for the Blackhawks during the 1985-86 season.
• Wild goaltending coach Bob Mason skated in 41 games for Chicago during the 1987-88 campaign.

Hello, Old Friend

The Wild and Blackhawks will meet for the first time this season tonight. After going 5-0-0 against Chicago last season, Minnesota became the first NHL team to win every game in a season series of at least five contests against the Blackhawks since the Boston Bruins went 8-0-0 in 1938-39. Minnesota's seven-game win streak is its longest against Chicago since its franchise-best nine-game win streak (1/20/06-1/11/08). In the last 20 regular season meetings dating back to April 1, 2012, the Wild is 13-6-1, with 11 of the games being decided by one goal and five in a shootout.

At the Rink

Minnesota did not skate Sunday after securing a 5-4 win Saturday night in Dallas.
Here are the projected lineups:
WILD
Zach Parise - Eric Staal - Charlie Coyle
Jason Zucker - Mikko Koivu - Mikael Granlund
Nino Niederreiter - Erik Haula - Jason Pominville
Chris Stewart - Tyler Graovac - Jordan Schroeder
Ryan Suter - Jared Spurgeon
Jonas Brodin - Christian Folin
Marco Scandella - Matt Dumba
Devan Dubnyk
Darcy Kuemper
BLACKHAWKS
Vince Hinostroza - Jonathan Toews - Marian Hossa
Artemi Panarin - Artem Anisimov - Patrick Kane
Ryan Hartman - Tanner Kero - Richard Panik
Andrew Desjardins - Nick Schmaltz - Jordin Tootoo
Duncan Keith - Niklas Hjalmarsson
Trevor van Riemsdyk - Brent Seabrook
Michal Kempny - Michal Rozsival
Corey Crawford
Scott Darling