(Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)

Reunions week continues on Wednesday for the Minnesota Wild, as the Nashville Predators visit the Xcel Energy Center.

The reunion in this game is Greg Zanon, facing his former team for the first time.  Zanon signed this offseason in Minnesota as a free agent.

The Wild are coming off of a disappointing loss in Chicago, as the team fell apart after dominating for much of the first ten minutes of the game, and the team will welcome this brief stay at home, where they remain undefeated (3-0-0).

These teams could be mirror images of one another at this point in the season, as both have offenses that are struggling greatly and both are coming off of disappointing losses to Chicago.

The teams split their four meetings last season and when the Wild won, they won in a big way.  The team scored 14 goals in their two victories, but failed to score once in their two losses.  That said, if the Wild are to get their offense on track, there is the potential for this one to be a huge confidence builder.

Both of these teams desperately need a win in this game as they are the bottom two teams in the Western Conference.

Lineups

Minnesota will likely skate the same lineup that they did in Chicago.  We will likely not see a whole lot of Derek Boogaard in the coming weeks, as John Scott will be filling in on the blueline for the injured Kim Johnsson.  With that in mind, here are the likely line combinations.

Brunette-Koivu-Miettinen

Havlat-Belanger-Sykora

Nolan-Brodziak-Clutterbuck

Pouliot-Sheppard-Kobasew

Schultz-Burns

Zanon-Zidlicky

Hnidy-Scott

On paper, these combos look pretty good, but the team needs to begin to gain some semblance of chemistry in order to start turning this season around.

For Nashville, it appears as if injured defenseman Dan Hamhuis will be back in the lineup, bolstering the team’s already strong blueline.  Here are the line combos that Nashville has been skating with in practice the last couple days.

Sullivan-Wilson-Hornqvist

Dumont-Legwand-Scratchard

Erat-Santorelli-Ward

Smithson-Goc-Belak

If these are the team’s lines, they will be breaking up the “money” line of Sullivan, Legwand and Erat.  Also, Jason Arnott and Jordin Tootoo are likely still out.

Between the Pipes

With the injury to Josh Harding, there’s no doubt that we’ll see a steady diet of Niklas Backstrom in the coming weeks.  Tonight should be no different as he’ll likely get the nod.

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