Coming off a strong and impressive showing against the Kings last night, the Wings are now looking for more of the same tonight against the Ducks. Hopefully a better result for this team, but after last night, you can’t be anything but hopeful for the future.

The Wings had the recent two-time cup winners on their heels last night. Maybe tonight they will be able to do the same thing to the Ducks, but it might be a more difficult task for this young team.

Their first back-to-back of the season, this young Wings team will be in tough against a team that is expected to make the playoffs or be labeled as a failure.

The forward lines look to be unchanged heading into this game. Probably a smart move considering such a short turnaround from last night’s game against the Kings. The Nyquist-Larkin-Mantha line has been excellent through the first two games. Controlling the ice whenever they’re out there and have been creating scoring chances from nothing.

Mantha especially, who has an on-ice Corsi plus/minus of +28, has been excellent through the first two games.

On the blueline, Trevor Daley went down early in last night’s game with an injury and Joe Hicketts has been confirmed to take his place for tonight’s game against the Ducks.

This will be the first true test of this group of defencemen. The first time in a while that the Red Wings will not have any defenceman over the age of 30 – it will be an interesting night.

Surprisingly, even with the injuries to Ryan Kesler, Corey Perry, Ondrej Kase, and Patrick Eaves, the Ducks still have a fairly deep forward group. That’s what you get when you draft well no matter where you’re picking in the draft. Recent draft picks Sam Steel, Troy Terry, and Maxime Comtois have seamlessly transitioned into becoming full-time NHL players.

The Ducks’ first pick in the 2018 NHL Draft, Isac Lundestrom, will be making his NHL debut by filling in for Ryan Getzlaf’s absence in the lineup due to a recent injury.

This defence group has been one of the most underrated and most solid groups in the whole league for the past couple of seasons. Even without Shea Theodore, they have been able to have one of the best top-4 defencemen in the NHL.

The All-American battle in net will be happening tonight. Howard will start his second game of the season, after surviving the onslaught of offense the Blue Jackets had against the Red Wings. He was able to stop 36 of 39 shots on net – let’s hope the Wings defence is a little bit better against this Ducks offense.

John Gibson has been one of the most exciting young goaltenders in the last decade. It’s been only two games for Gibson so far this year, but he still has a .973 sv% – absolutely mental. Gibson played 60 games last season for the Ducks and was able to maintain a .926 sv%. He isn’t far from winning a Vezina trophy in his young career.

Puck drop is at 10:00 p.m. EST at the Honda Center in Anaheim, California. The game will be, as always, on Fox Sports-Detroit.

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