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Monday, 17 October 2011 10:00

Written by Seth Rorabaugh

A preview of the Thrashers Jets.

When and where: 8:30 p.m., EDT; MTS Centre.

TV: Root Sports; TSN.

Record: 0-3-0, 0 points. The Thrashers Jets have the worst record in the NHL.

Leading Scorer: Jim Slater, 2 points (2 goals).

Last Game: 4-1 road loss to the Coyotes, Saturday. Captain Andrew Ladd (right) had a goal for the Thrashers Jets.

Last Game against the Penguins: 5-2 loss April 10. Pascal Dupuis had a goal and an assist for the Penguins. This was the Jets/Thrashers franchise's last game in Atlanta.

Thrashers Jets Player We Would Bet Money On Scoring: Nik Antropov. In his past 17 games against the Penguins, Antropov has 23 points.

Ex-Penguins on the Thrashers Jets: Chris Thorburn, RW.

Ex-Thrashers/Jets on the Penguins: Jason Botterill, assistant general manager; Pascal Dupuis, RW; Chris Kunitz, LW; Todd Reirden, assistant general manager; Boris Valabik, D.

Useless Thrashers Jets Trivia Vaguely Related to the Penguins: Dupuis is the Thrashers/Jets franchise's career leader in playoff scoring with three points.

Best Thrashers Jets Video We Could Find: An oldie but a goodie. Take some Vitamin J:

Probable goaltenders: Marc-Andre Fleury (3-1-0, 2.71 GAA, .907 GAA) for the Penguins and Ondrej Pavelec (0-2-0, 4.56 GAA, .833 SV%) for the Thrashers Jets.

Injuries: For the Penguins, center Evgeni Malkin (lower-body) and defenseman Brook Orpik (abdominal) are out. Defenseman Roberto Bortuzzo (knee), Boris Valabik (knee), center Sidney Crosby (concussion), left winger Dustin Jeffrey (knee) and right winger Nick Petersen (concussion) are on injured reserve. For the Thrashers Jets, right winger Eric Fehr (shoulder) and center Aaron Gagnon (undisclosed) are doubtful. Center Ben Maxwell ("upper body") and left winger Kenndal McArdle (foot) are on injured reserve.

Potential lines and defensive pairings: The Penguins did not practice yesterday. Their primary lines against the Sabres Saturday were:

Steve Sullivan - Mark Letestu - James Neal
Chris Kunitz - Jordan Staal - Tyler Kennedy
Matt Cooke - Joe Vitale - Pascal Dupuis
Arron Asham - Richard Park - Craig Adams

Paul Martin - Zbynek Michalek
Kris Letang - Deryk Engelland
Matt Niskanen - Ben Lovejoy

-The Thrashers Jets primary lines and defensive pairings against the Coyotes Saturday were:

Andrew Ladd - Bryan Little - Blake Wheeler
Evander Kane - Alexander Burmistrov - Nik Antropov
Tanner Glass - Jim Slater - Kyle Wellwood
Tim Stapleton - Mark Scheifele - Chris Thorburn

Dustin Byfuglien - Randy Jones
Ron Hainsey - Tobias Enstrom
Mark Stuart - Zach Bogosian

Notes:

-A native of Manitoba, Asham gets to play an NHL game in his neck of the woods for the first time.

-Kris Letang is logging a lot of ice time.

-Crosby, Jeffrey, Malkin and Orpik did not travel with the team.

-The Penguins' last game in Winnipeg was a 1-0 shutout win against the orginal Jets franchise. Jaromir Jagr scored the only goal. Tom Barrasso made 32 saves.

-The Penguins have an all-time record of 13-9-1 in Winnipeg.

-Staal has 97 career goals.

-Park has 96 career goals.

-Our live blog direct from our couch begins at approximately 8:30 p.m. Please tune in.

(Photo: Marianne Helm/Getty Images)

Comments (3)

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written by Blitzburgh Brian, October 17, 2011 - 10:31 AM

HTML strikeout city.

Are we back to just not having a top line center? Malkin not even coming on the trip is pretty disappointing.

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written by kpa42, October 17, 2011 - 11:19 AM

Does anyone else suspect Geno pushed himself too hard to both be in and be beastly in the Caps-Pens game because it was the Lokomotiv benefit game and he potentially exacerbated the injury/incision in doing so?

Full marks for his heart being in the right place. But man...hope this clears up soon. See him in beast mode when he's in the lineup actually makes the lsoing games missing both him and Sid (And Brooks!) that much harder to swallow.

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written by kuhfuss5, October 17, 2011 - 04:37 PM

I can't believe that Pascal Dupuis is the Thrashers Jets career leader in playoff points. I love Dupuis, but that definitely says something about the state of the franchise.

kpa42 - Totally agree with your suspicions about Malkin. I don't know if exacerbated the injury, but he definitely pushed himself to play in that game.

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