Jimmy Howard shows his broken right index finger to the media Friday morning at Rexall Place. (Photo by Bill Roose/Detroit Red Wings)

EDMONTON, Alberta – Friday morning as Jimmy Howard spent in his hotel room in downtown Edmonton, he was awakened by a pulsating in his right index finger.

“It woke me up around 7 a.m. and felt like it (finger) was going pop off,” Howard said.

Howard suffered the fracture early in the third period of Thursday’s 4-3 shoot-out win at Vancouver. He said it occurred when the Canucks’ Max Lapierre fired a low shot that got underneath Howard’s blocker.

“Lapierre spun and shot it, missed my blocker and caught me right on the finger,” he said. “It is broken and we’ll see here. Won’t play the rest of the road trip and we’ll go home and see our doctors there and get their opinion.”

Immediately following the win, Howard had an X-ray taken at Rogers Arena, which showed a “clean break,” he said. “I’ve played with broken fingers before, so I’ll have to fool around with my sticks and cut some notches out of them.”

Backup goalie Ty Conklin will get the start against the Oilers at Rexall Place tonight. Meanwhile, Joey MacDonald has been recalled from Grand Rapids and will be Conklin’s backup tonight.

Conklin has played in 10 games this season – all on the road – while posting a 3-5-0 record with a 3.02 goal-against average. This will be Conklin’s first start at Rexall in nearly three years, since leading the Wings to a 3-2 win on March 24, 2009.

“This is a good opportunity, he gets a chance and he’s ready to go, so let’s get at it,” Wings coach Mike Babcock said. “We’ve got to play real well like we always try to do and if we get do that we’ll give Conks a chance to be good.”