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Friday, 11 November 2011 11:00

Written by Seth Rorabaugh

When and where: 7 p.m. EST, Consol Energy Center.

TV: Root Sports, Fox Sports Southwest, NHL Network (United States).

Record: 11-3-0, 22 points. The Stars have the most overall points in the NHL.

Leading Scorer: Jamie Benn, 18 points (5 goals, 13 assists).

Last Game: 5-2 road win against the Capitals, Tuesday. Michael Ryder had two goals for the Stars.

Last Game against the Penguins: 5-2 home win, Nov. 3, 2010. Brent Johnson made 24 saves for the Penguins.

Stars Player We Would Bet Money On Scoring: Benn. He has a six-game scoring streak. During that span he has 11 points (3 goals, 6 assists).

Ex-Penguins on the Stars: Stu Barnes, hockey operations consultant; Alex Goligoski (above), D; Jiri Hrdina, amateur scout; Toby Petersen, C; Gary Roberts, player development consultant.

Ex-Stars/North Stars on the Penguins: Jason Botterill, assistant general manager; Bill Guerin, player development coach; Gilles Meloche, goaltending coach; James Neal, RW; Matt Niskanen, D.

Useless Stars/North Stars Trivia Vaguely Related to the Penguins: Niskanen is one of five one-time Penguins to wear No. 5 for the Stars/North Stars franchise. The others were Darryl Sydor, Neal Wilkinson, Ville Siren and Leo Boivin.

Best Stars Video We Could Find: Gilles Meloche in what is probably the worst pizza commercial off all time while a member of the North Stars:

Probable goaltenders: Marc-Andre Fleury (8-2-1, 1.95 GAA, .931 SV%) for the Penguins and Kari Lehtonen (11-1-0, 2.13 GAA; .936 SV%) for the Stars.

Injuries: For the Penguins, centers Sidney Crosby (concussion), Tyler Kennedy (concussion), defensemen Ben Lovejoy (left wrist), Zbynek Michalek (finger) and Brian Strait (elbow) are on injured reserve. For the Stars, left winger Brenden Morrow (elbow) is probable. Left winger Steve Ott (hip pointer) is on injured reserve.

Potential lines and defensive pairings: With the recent run of injuries and moves between the NHL and AHL levels, the Penguins lines and defensive pairing are never a sure thing. Here's an educated guess:

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

Kris Letang - Paul Martin
Deryk Engelland - Brooks Orpik
Matt Niskanen - Alexandre Picard

The Stars primary lines and defensive pairings against the Capitals Tuesday were:

Loui Eriksson - Jamie Benn - Michael Ryder
Brenden Morrow - Mike Ribeiro - Adam Burish
Eric Nystrom - Vernon Fiddler - Radek Dvorak
Jake Dowell - Tom Wandell - Toby Petersen

Sheldon Souray - Stephane Robidas
Trevor Daley - Nicklas Grossman
Alex Goligoski - Mark Fistric

Notes:

-Welcome back Alex Goligoski (PG+)

-Crosby will not play in the next two games.

-Welcome back Eric Tangradi. (PG+)

-Kennedy will be a game-time decision.

-Neal has appeared in 249 career games.

-Cooke has 99 career points with the Penguins.

-Kunitz has 298 career points.

-Park has 97 career goals.

-No money. No problem. The Stars are the best team in the NHL despite several off-ice issues.

-In honor of Veterans Day, donations will be accepted to benefit the “Support Our Heroes” program.

(Photo: Christian Petersen/Getty Images)

Comments (2)

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written by snickers99, November 11, 2011 - 09:14 AM

Over/under on 'Neal was a Dallas Star'? It's Friday night...let's make it a drinking game. Drink every time someone mentions that Neal was on the Stars.

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written by Blitzburgh Brian, November 11, 2011 - 09:26 AM

"he has 11 points (3 goals, 6 assists)."

Gonna go ahead and call shenanigans on this.

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