Ain't No Thing But A Red Wing

It's the third game of four in a home-standoff. The Blue Jackets have won their previous three games and have brought themselves within one point of the New Jersey Devils, who currently hold the first wildcard spot.

Columbus played last night against the Colorado Avalanche in which the boys in blue were able to win it in overtime. Seth Jones got the game-winner not even a minute in.

Three goals all within a minute of each other is how the fight started off last night at Nationwide. Tyson Barrie and Carl Soderberg scored for the Aves within 12 seconds of each other, but Boone Jenner was able to cut the deficit with a goal of his own 41 seconds later. Vanek was able to tie up the score 1:19 into the second period, and that's when Columbus really got on a roll.

The Blue Jackets are not known as a second period team, but they pulled that period off beautifully. After Vanek's goal, Zach Werenski got his 14th of the season and shortly thereafter, Vanek scored his second of the night. Columbus outshot Colorado 14-10 in the second period, and by all means, it looked like they were set to dominate the rest of the game.

Though their defense has gotten better in games of late, CBJ hung Korpi out to dry in the third. Gabriel "Gabe the Babe" Landeskog scored late in the period, and then Soderberg was able to get another goal for the Avalanche forcing the game into overtime.

There were a couple of close calls in the extra five minutes of play, but Seth Jones was able to make quick work of the Aves. 59 seconds in, Jones wins the game and notches his 11th goal. French Bread (Pierre-Luc Dubois and Artemi Panarin) draw the assists.

With this win, Columbus is now up to 75 points, one behind New Jersey's 76. It provides a little extra cushion for the team with Florida sitting at 73 and Carolina at 71. Nevertheless, the team can't lose their focus now. Werenski feels the club can't focus on those who are behind them, but in fact, are in front:

"We've got to stop looking at who's behind us and start looking at who's in front of us, trying to catch them. We're playing some good hockey right now and we're not that far off the teams in front of us, so hopefully we can catch one."

The Jackets only trail the Philadelphia Flyers by four points, who are currently third in the Metropolitan Division. Philly doesn't play tonight, so if Columbus can win against the Red Wings, they could pull ahead of the Devils and could be within two points of the Flyers. It would add to their cushion between Florida and Carolina, hopefully guaranteeing them a spot in some post-season hockey.

Another positive as of late is how well the Jackets have been scoring. Early on in the season, scoring goals was a huge issue for the club and was constantly something Tortorella was trying to work on. However, in the past three games, Columbus has notched three or more goals, a first this season for consecutive games.

Columbus is nearing the end of their season with only 13 games left after tonight. Detroit and Montreal aren't contenders for a playoff spot, so it's a good way to get points outside of their division, but they still have to keep a close eye. Philadelphia and New Jersey both play teams all within the Metro, so they could very easily overtake other teams and hold their positions until the end.

Hopefully Bob will be back in net tonight. He's missed two games after being sick. Tuesday he wasn't even well enough to play backup, so the team had to call up Jeff Zatkoff. Bobrovsky was feeling a bit better yesterday and participated in the morning skate. He didn't start, but instead backed up Korpisalo.

CBJ Projected Lineup

Artemi Panarin - Pierre-Luc Dubois - Cam Atkinson

Sonny Milano - Nick Foligno - Oliver Bjorkstrand

Boone Jenner - Alexander Wennberg - Thomas Vanek

Matt Calvert - Mark Letestu - Brandon Dubinsky

Zach Werenski - Seth Jones

Jack Johnson - Ryan Murray

Ian Cole - David Savard

Sergei Bobrovsky

Red Wings Projected Lineup

Tyler Bertuzzi - Henrik Zetterberg - Gustav Nyquist

Martin Frk - Dylan Larkin - Anthony Mantha

Justin Abdelkader - Andreas Athanasiou - Evgeny Svechnikov

Luke Witkowski - Luke Glendening - Darren Helm

Jonathan Ericsson - Trevor Daley

Dan DeKeyser - Nick Jensen

Niklas Kronwall - Mike Green

Jimmy Howard