DETROIT -- After this morning’s skate, Red Wings coach Mike Babcock confirmed that forward Pavel Datsyuk will miss tonight’s game against the surging Los Angeles Kings at Joe Louis Arena.
 
According to Babcock, Datsyuk is listed as day-to-day with an upper-body injury.
 
With the loss of another forward, Babcock has been forced to restructure his lines once again.  This morning’s lines were as follows:
 
Dan Cleary – Henrik Zetterberg – Todd Bertuzzi
Ville Leino – Valtteri Filppula – Jason Williams
Justin Abdelkader – Darren Helm – Patrick Eaves
Kirk Maltby – Kris Draper – Tomas Holmstrom
 
Babcock said the Kings will be sending four impressive forward units at the Wings.
 
“LA’s got three good lines, and I thought (Brad) Richardson’s line, the fourth unit, played with energy last night, too," said Babcock, referring to the Kings' 4-2 loss to the New York Rangers. "I thought LA played really good. So we’re going to need three good lines to play against their lines, so whoever is playing the best.”
 
Babcock will be expecting another impressive outing from his second line: Filppula, Leino and Williams.
 
“They’ve been our best line, consistently our best line," Babcock said. "I think Williams has four points, you look at what he can bring, and from what I can see I think that’s great. We need scoring out of our big guys, and Fil seems to be, the last couple games, doing that part. He’s been our best forward the whole way. We’d like Leino to shoot the puck more, but they’ve been a good line for us, and they’ve played well against whoever they’ve played against, so that gives us something stable.”