Stars Host Canadiens Amid Injury Woes

The Dallas Stars face a tough scheduling test Thursday night when the Montreal Canadiens arrive at 7 p.m. CST. The home squad is missing seven players due to injury, creating a significant gap in their roster depth before the season's first meeting between the two teams.

The Canadiens enter the matchup riding a three-game winning streak. They are 7-3-2 overall and 3-1-1 on the road. Montreal ranks second in the league with 62 total penalties, averaging 5.2 per game. Their scoring is led by Nicholas Suzuki, who has five goals and seven assists this season.

Dallas sits at 7-4-1 overall and 4-2-0 at home. The Stars have a plus-eight goal differential, scoring 32 times while allowing 24. Mikko Rantanen leads the team with six goals and eight assists. Jason Robertson has added five goals and eight assists in the last ten games.

The injury list for Dallas is lengthy. Oskar Back, Radek Faksa, Cameron Hughes, Esa Lindell, and Matt Duchene are out. Sam Steel and Kyle Capobianco are day-to-day. The Canadiens also list five injured players, including Ivan Demidov, Lucas Condotta, Nick Suzuki, Bryce Pickford, and Samuel Montembeault.

In their last ten games, the Stars went 7-2-1 while averaging 3.1 goals per game. The Canadiens went 6-3-1 over the same span, averaging 2.8 goals. Both teams have been active on the penalty kill, with Dallas averaging 4.2 penalties and Montreal averaging 5.2.