ST. PAUL - The Minnesota Wild (41-29-7) hosts the Dallas Stars (50-22-4) for an afternoon game today against a divisional rival. 

The Wild will be without defenseman Jake Middleton tonight but head coach John Hynes said before the game that Middleton avoided a major injury.

Filip Gustavsson will start again for the Wild today. It is his 13th straight in the Wild's last 14 games.

Hometown kid Jake Oettinger will start today for the Stars.  He is 36-15-3 on the year with a 2.45 goals-against average and a .912 save percentage. He is 7-0-2 against the Wild in his career with a 2.13 goals-against average and a .922 save percentage. 

Declan Chisholm will enter the lineup tonight for Middleton. No other changes for the Wild. The Wild recalled defenseman Cameron Crotty from the AHL but he won't play. 

Here are tonight's projected lines (subject to change). 

Wild Projected Lines

Marcus Foligno - Marco Rossi - Matt Boldy

Marcus Johansson - Freddy Gaudreau - Mats Zuccarello

Gustav Nyquist - Ryan Hartman - Vinnie Hinostroza

Yakov Trenin - Devin Shore - Justin Brazeau

Defense:

Jonas Brodin - Brock Faber

Declan Chisholm - Jared Spurgeon

Jon Merrill - Zach Bogosian

Starting Goaltender: Filip Gustavsson 

Scratched: Brendan Gaunce, Cameron Crotty

Injured: Kirill Kaprizov (lower), Joel Eriksson Ek (lower), Jake Middleton (upper). 

Stars Projected Lines

Jason Robertson - Roope Hintz - Mikko Rantanen

Mason Marchment - Matt Duchene - Mikael Granlund

Sam Steel - Wyatt Johnston - Mavrik Bourque

Evgenii Dadonov - Oscar Back - Colin Blackwell

Defense:

Thomas Harley - Ilya Lyubushkin

Esa Lindell - Cody Ceci

Lian Bichsel - Matt Dumba

Starting Goaltender: Jake Oettinger

Scratched: Brendan Smith

Injured: Jamie Benn (lower), Miro Heiskanen (lower), Nils Lundkvist (upper), Tyler Seguin (lower).