The Detroit Red Wings and the San Jose Sharks meet in NHL action from the SAP Center on Thursday night.
The Detroit Red Wings will be out to snap a four-game losing skid after a 3-2 OT loss to Anaheim last time out. Dominik Kubalik leads Detroit in scoring with 18 points including a team-high 7 goals and 11 assists while Dylan Larkin is just behind with 7 goals and 10 assists for his 17 points. David Perron has 11 points with 5 goals and 6 assists and Filip Hronek has 10 assists. Ville Husso has gone 5-2-3 with a 2.56 GAA and a .918 save percentage while Alex Nedeljkovic is 2-3-1 with a 4.34 GAA and an .873 save percentage between the pipes for Detroit this season.
The San Jose Sharks will hope to build on their current three-game win streak after a 5-2 win over Vegas last time out. Erik Karlsson has a team-high 24 points with a team-high 10 goals and 14 assists while Timo Meier and Tomas Hertl each have 15 points with Meier split between 8 goals and 7 assists while Hertl has 4 goals and 11 assists this season. Logan Couture also has 13 points with 7 goals and 6 assists this season. James Reimer has gone 5-5-2 with a 2.81 GAA and a .909 save percentage while Kaapo Kahkonen is 1-4-1 with a 3.70 GAA and an .878 save percentage in goal for the Sharks this season.
Detroit is 26-82 in their last 108 road games and 2-5 in their last 7 games against a team with a losing record while the under is 5-2 in their last 7 games overall. San Jose is 16-41 in their last 57 games overall and 8-21 in their last 29 home games while the over is 6-0-1 in their last 7 home games.
I get the reasoning for backing (or fading) either team here, but I’m leaning towards the Red Wings here because I’m not about laying any sort of juice with a team like San Jose who have lost 8 of their 9 home games this year. Detroit’s struggled on the road for a couple of years now, but the Red Wings are the lesser of two evils here being on the road, so give me Detroit.