Preview: Ducks Host League-Leading Wild on Women in Sports Night

The Ducks conclude a four-game homestand tonight, hosting the league-leading Minnesota Wild on Women in Sports Night at Honda Center.

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Tonight's game marks Anaheim's third annual Women in Sports Night celebration, beginning with a panel dicussion and networking opportunity at ARTIC prior to the game. To purchase your ticket to the pre-game panel, featuring San Diego Ducks Sled Hockey founder Sarah Bettencourt, Emmy-winning ESPN TV Producer Aisha Chaney, Olympic Gold Medalists Natasha Watley and Caroline Marks, World Surf League Commissioner Jessi-Miley Dyer, LA Sparks President Christine Monjer and Hockey Hall of Famer Angela Ruggiero, or for more information on Women in Sports Night, click here.

On the ice, the Ducks return to action after a 3-1 loss to division rival Vegas Golden Knights Wednesday night at home. The Ducks got on the board in the second period on defenseman Jackson LaCombe's sixth career NHL goal, pulling within one after Vegas had taken early control, but would be unable to find an equalizer before winger Alexander Holtz's insurance marker early in the third.

"I thought that whatever chances we did generate, we surprisingly had some sneaky chances in the second period that went down right in front of the net, we didn’t score," head coach Greg Cronin said. "They scored on their chances..We gave them two-on-ones on poor decisions at the offensive blueline....We can’t give them those chances. Credit to them, they played back-to-back games and I thought they won a lot of puck battles and were able to sustain a lot of offensive zone time. I wouldn’t be surprised at the end of the game if the chances were similar, but i think they had higher quality chances."

The loss dropped Anaheim to 10-11-3 on the season but the club still own points in six of their last nine games (5-3-1).

"We know the team now," Cronin said. "It’s 24 games into the year and on this run we’ve been on, there has been a pace that we have played with where we’ve dictated a lot of the paces in the game. Half of the first period, I didn’t see the same pace we should have play with. For whatever reason, we didn’t have the same speed to our game. It came and went in [the Seattle game] and there were times in the Buffalo game where it came and went. [Wednesday], I didn’t see the high end pace that we’ve been playing with over the last 10 games."

On the injury front, it was one step forward and one step back for the Ducks, as the team welcomed defensive Cam Fowler back into the lineup but lost forward Trevor Zegras to a lower-body injury later that night. Fowler, who tonight will tie Ducks legend Corey Perry for second-most games played in franchise history, skated 20:08 in his return, finishing with three shot attempts and one takeaway.

"[I felt] pretty good, actually," Fowler said. "It is always hard getting the first one out of the way after an extended amount of time off, so just tried to keep it as simple as possible. But, you know, my lungs and my conditioning felt pretty good, so I was happy about that."

Zegras left the game early in the second period following an awkward fall in front of the Anaheim net. He was helped off the ice and did not return. Anaheim has not yet announced an update on Zegras or linemate Leo Carlsson, who has not played since leaving the Nov. 25th game against Seattle with an upper-body injury. Neither is expected to play tonight, but Carlsson skated at Honda Center Friday morning.

Meanwhile on the other bench tonight is a Wild team that owns a cool 10-1-3 record on the road and comes to Anaheim with points in eight of its last ten games (7-2-1), including a four-game winning streak. Minnesota last played on Tuesday, finishing its homestand with a comeback 3-2 win in overtime against Vancouver.

"I thought it was a hard-fought game by both teams, kind the style of game that we felt this morning when we talked what it was going to be, and it certainly lived up to that,” Wild coach John Hynes told NHL.com's Jessi Pierce postgame. “I really liked our mental and physical toughness in the game...It was physical, it was hard, we came back twice.”

The Wild claimed a 5-2 victory in the season's first meeting with the Ducks last month at Honda Center. Mason McTavish and Robby Fabbri scored for Anaheim that night, but a three-point performance by leading-scorer Kirill Kaprizov would spark a productive night for the Wild attack. Jonas Gustavsson, this week named to Sweden's 4 Nations Face-Off roster, stopped 33-of-35 Anaheim shots.

Minnesota (17-4-4, 38 points) leads the Central Division and Western Conference.