Red Wings  0    Blue Jackets  1

Detroit Red Wings (19-14-5) at Columbus Blue Jackets (14-18-7), 7 p.m.

Sports Network | December 28, 2009

(Sports Network) - The Columbus Blue Jackets will try to end the longest losing streak in club history and avoid a home-and-home sweep when they host the Detroit Red Wings tonight at Nationwide Arena.

The Blue Jackets have lost nine straight games and are tied for the franchise's longest-ever winless stretch. Columbus, which is 0-7-2 during its current skid, also went 0-6-2 with a tie from December 4-23, 2003.

In addition to losing nine in a row, the Blue Jackets have also dropped 12 of 13 and 17 of their last 19 outings. Saturday's loss in Detroit was also the club's 11th in a row on the road, tying a franchise record for longest road losing streak.

Columbus enters the finale of this home-and-home with a three-game losing streak as the host. The Jackets are 8-6-4 overall at Nationwide Arena this season.

Meanwhile, the Red Wings were able to end a three-game skid with the home victory over Columbus. Todd Bertuzzi scored a pair of goals to lift Detroit to the 2-1 decision at Joe Louis Arena.

Nicklas Lidstrom had two assists for the Red Wings, while Jimmy Howard made 28 saves for the victors.

"We were pretty disappointed in our start. We didn't come out and do anything that we wanted to do. It was nice that we turned it around," Bertuzzi said.

The Red Wings had center Valtteri Filppula back on the ice for the first time in over two months on Saturday as he returned from a broken right wrist suffered on October 29 in Edmonton.

Despite Filppula's return, Detroit is far from being healthy as Henrik Zetterberg, Johan Franzen, Jonathan Ericsson, Dan Cleary, Niklas Kronwall, Jason Williams, Cory Emmerton and Andrea Lilja all continue to be sidelined due to injuries.

The Red Wings are 7-7-3 as the guest this year and will try to halt a two-game road losing streak tonight.

Antoine Vermette lit the lamp for the Blue Jackets in Saturday's loss, while Mathieu Garon turned aside 25-of-27 shots for Columbus.

"It's a struggle for us right now. We're trying to find anything positive to build on here," Blue Jackets forward Fredrik Modin said.

Steve Mason will get the start in net for Columbus tonight as Blue Jackets head coach Ken Hitchcock has stated that his goaltenders will alternate starts until the losing streak is snapped.

Detroit has taken three straight and eight of the last 11 meetings with Columbus and that doesn't count last spring's four-game sweep of the Blue Jackets in the Western Conference quarterfinals. The Blue Jackets have lost five of six and seven of their last nine regular-season tilts in the Motor City,