Tonight is almost nearly kinda-sorta if you squint a little bit a battle of first against worst. The San Jose Sharks are tied for last place in the Pacific Division in the 34 points club with the Anaheim Ducks and Los Angeles Kings, beating out both of them by just one regulation win for sixth place.
The Vegas Golden Knights, meanwhile, are in a different three-way tie, duking it out with the Arizona Coyotes and Edmonton Oilers, who all have 44 points. Though Vegas has one fewer regulation win than the teams on either side of their second-place slot, the team’s six overtime losses prop them up a bit, as well as their game in-hand on Edmonton. They’ve also earned a point in each of their last five games.
It’s the finale in a season series between two rivals and somehow it’s not even Christmas. The scheduling this year is pretty wack.
On the flip side, just remember that you won’t have to watch Golden Knights hockey in 2020 until October.
Let’s just hope everyone makes it out in one piece, yeah?
Lines
Sharks
No expected changes, Dell in for the #SJSharks pic.twitter.com/pkh9BheZCI
— Fear the Festivus (@fearthefin) December 23, 2019
Expected Scratches: Noah Gregor, Antti Suomela
Injured Reserve: Dalton Prout (upper body), Radim Simek (knee), Mario Ferraro (upper body)
Golden Knights (via NHL.com)
Jonathan Marchessault — William Karlsson — Reilly Smith
Max Pacioretty — Chandler Stephenson — Mark Stone
Valentin Zykov — Paul Stastny — Alex Tuch
William Carrier — Tomas Nosek — Ryan Reaves
Brayden McNabb — Nate Schmidt
Nicolas Hague — Shea Theodore
Jon Merrill — Deryk Engelland
Malcolm Subban
Marc-Andre Fleury
Expected Scratches: Nick Holden
Injured Reserve: Cody Eakin (head), Cody Glass (head)
Where to Watch
Puck drop from SAP Center will be at 7 PT/10 ET. Tonight’s broadcast will be available on NBC Sports California in the Bay Area and on ATTSN-RM for the visitors’ market. Streaming will be available on NHLtv. The radio call will be on 98.5 KFOX or available to stream through the Sharks + SAP Center app.
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