Tuesday Dallas Stars Roundup: Going Viral, Jake Oettinger's First Half, and the Responsibility of Alex Petrovic

Tonight's game starts on TNT at 6:30pm

The Dallas Stars are once again battling some illness among the team, as cold weather continues to coincide with cold & flu season in Texas.

“Probably be some game-time decisions here tonight,” Glen Gulutzan said before an optional morning skate on Tuesday. “We got a couple guys sick, so not sure about the lineup.”

It’s not clear which players might be suffering from illness. Mikko Rantanen was the only player to miss practice on Monday, though that absence was described as a maintenance day by Gulutzan. And with the team only holding an optional (and early) morning skate on Tuesday ahead of an early 6:30pm start (on TNT), any final lineup decisions are only guesswork, for now.

However, we have gotten a couple of hints. Yesterday, in fact, we saw Justin Hryckowian skating on the left side of Wyatt Johnston, and Gulutzan did say on Monday that seeing a Hryckowian-Johnston-Rantanen line tonight might be a possibility.

“Yeah, I’m thinking about [that line],” Gulutzan said. “I thought Ritzy’s been really good, one of our steadier guys here especially in our last few games […] I’m not completely sure yet what my lines are tomorrow, but wanted to give him a little practice there today.”