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Saturday, 30 October 2010 11:18

Written by Seth Rorabaugh

A preview of the Hurricanes.

When and where: 7 p.m., RBC Center.

TV: FSN Pittsburgh, FSN Carolina.

Record: 5-4-0, 10 points. The Hurricanes are in ninth place in the Eastern Conference and fourth place in the Southeast Division.

Leading Scorer: Jeff Skinner and Eric Staal (right), 7 points (4 goals, 3 assists each).

Last Game: 4-3 road win against the Rangers, last night. Skinner had two goals and an assist for the Hurricanes.

Last Game against the Penguins: 3-2 road overtime time win, March 20. Alexei Ponikarovsky had two assists for the Penguins.

Hurricanes Player We Would Bet Money On Scoring: Jiri Tlusty. He scored his first career goal against the Penguins.

Ex-Penguins on the Hurricanes: Tom Barrasso, assistant coach; Ron Francis, associate head coach/director of player personnel; Tom Kostopoulos, RW; Jim Rutherford, general manager/president.

Ex-Hurricanes on the Penguins: Craig Adams, RW.

Useless Whalers/Hurricanes Trivia Vaguely Related to the Penguins: Excluding their WHL days, Francis is one of three former Whalers/Hurricanes captains who also played for the Penguins. The others are Russ Anderson and Mark Johnson.

Best Hurricanes Video We Could Find: This incredibly cheesy pre-game montage from a local Hartford television station prior to a Whalers game:

Probable goaltenders: No one knows for sure, but considering each team played its No. 1 goaltender last night and travel is involved, we would suspect Brent Johnson (4-0-1, 1.39 GAA, .951 SV%) for the Penguins and Justin Peters (0-1-0, 4.06 GAA, .852 SV%) for the Hurricanes.

Injuries: For the Penguins, left winger Eric Godard (illness) and center Evgeni Malkin (undisclosed) are questionable. Defenseman Zbynek Michalek (shoulder) is out. Center Jordan Staal (foot) and defenseman Alex Grant (wrist) are on injured reserve. For the Hurricanes, they are reporting no injuries.

Potential lines and defensive pairings:

-The Penguins primary lines and defensive pairing against the Flyers last night were:

Chris Kunitz - Sidney Crosby - Pascal Dupuis
Mike Comrie - Mark Letestu - Evgeni Malkin
Matt Cooke - Max Talbot - Tyler Kennedy
Mike Rupp - Craig Adams - Arron Asham

Paul Martin - Kris Letang
Alex Goligoski - Deryk Engelland
Brooks Orpik - Ben Lovejoy

The Hurricanes' primary liens and defensive pairings against the Rangers last night were:

Jussi Jokinen - Eric Staal - Chad LaRose
Jeff Skinner - Tuomo Ruutu - Erik Cole
Sergei Samsonov - Brandon Sutter - Tom Kostopoulos
Patrick O'Sullivan - Pat Dywer - Jiri Tlusty

Tim Gleason - Joe Corvo
Joni Pitkanen - Andrew McBain
Jay Harrison - Anton Babchuk

-The Hurricanes' primary lines and defensive pairings against the Hurricanes last night were:

Notes:

-Evgeni Malkin is expected to test out his undisclosed injury prior to the game.

-Marc-Andre Fleury has 149 career wins.

-The Penguins will be wearing their "dreaded" blue throwback jerseys tonight.

-Our live blog begins at approximately 7 p.m. Please tune in.

(Photo: Jeff Gross/Getty Images)

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