Projected Lineup: Avalanche vs. Golden Knights (March 25, 2021)

The Colorado Avalanche opens a six-game homestand tonight at Ball Arena when it hosts the Vegas Golden Knights. It is the first of a two-game set between the clubs.
Colorado is coming off a 5-4 shootout loss on Tuesday at the Arizona Coyotes and has points in each of its last eight contests (7-0-1). Vegas is 6-1-0 in its last seven games and leads the West Division with 45 points, two more than the second-place Avs (43 points).

Rookie defenseman Bowen Byram will return to the lineup after missing the Avalanche's last outing with a lower-body injury. Dan Renouf will be scratched.
Colorado will also have a new-look fourth line as J.T. Compher will also return to game action and will play on a trio with Pierre-Edouard Bellemare and Logan O'Connor. Matt Calvert won't play as he is dealing with some nagging injuries, and head coach Jared Bednar said he wants to ice a healthy roster whenever possible with the team playing at least every other night for the rest of the season.
Goaltender Philipp Grubauer is expected to start in net for the 26th time this season after Jonas Johansson guarded the pipes in the club's last game. Grubauer is on a career-long seven-game winning streak and is first in the NHL in shutouts (five) and goals-against average (1.71), second in wins (19) and third in save percentage (.930).
Colorado isn't expected to make any other changes to its lineup.
On Wednesday, the Avs reassigned forwards Jayson Megna and Kiefer Sherwood from their taxi squad to the American Hockey League's Colorado Eagles.
Below is the Avalanche's projected lineup for tonight's game against the Vegas Golden Knights. All forward combinations and defensive pairings are subject to change.
Forwards
92 Gabriel Landeskog - 29 Nathan MacKinnon - 96 Mikko Rantanen
20 Brandon Saad - 91 Nazem Kadri - 95 Andre Burakovsky
13 Valeri Nichushkin - 17 Tyson Jost - 72 Joonas Donskoi
37 J.T. Compher - 41 Pierre-Edouard Bellemare - 25 Logan O'Connor
Defensemen
7 Devon Toews - 8 Cale Makar
34 Jacob MacDonald - 49 Samuel Girard
27 Ryan Graves - 4 Bowen Byram
Goaltenders
31 Philipp Grubauer
35 Jonas Johansson
Scratch: Matt Calvert
Taxi Squad: Greg Pateryn, Dan Renouf, Adam Werner
Injury Report: Pavel Francouz (lower body), Erik Johnson (upper body), Conor Timmins (upper body)