This is the first of three games against Columbus in the remaining 6.  With my astoundingly brilliant mathematical skills, that’s half of the games left in the season that will be against the Blue Jax.

Looking at what’s left:

In the first three meetings between the BJs, Detroit has the advantage, 2-0-1, including that glorious 9-1 smackdown way back in November.  However, the last time Detroit and Columbus met, it was a pretty insane goaltending battle, so hearing the noise that Mason is rounding back into form, the Wings need to be wary and on their game.

The Winged Wheelers rolled through March with a 12-2-1 record.  They should be able to keep that up against Columbus, who is hanging on towards the bottom of the conference at 14th.  The Blue Jackets, however, have won their last 2 games, including a 4-2 victory over Chicago.  This game, and the other two, aren’t necessarily going to be a cake-walk: the Jax are 10-5-4 under their new interim coach, Claude Noel, and it doesn’t sound like they are willing to just fade into the background as an end to the season.  I think they could easily take advantage of a distracted Wings team in one of these three upcoming games.

According to The Dispatch, Steve Mason will be in net for Columbus.  Portzline also says to “expect no changes” for the Red Wings, which suggests that we’ll see Howard again.  This also means Cleary will not be back, most likely.  Helm and Williams had maintenance days, but will be playing.

Babcock is apparently “just worried about playing better,” and he’s not alone in that regard.  The Wings have more or less secured a spot in the playoffs, but that doesn’t mean they can afford to sit back and relax in this final stretch, like they usually can.  6 points back from a somewhat slumping Chicago, it’s feasible that they could still make a run for the division.  But they can’t go out and play like they did in the second and third periods of the Oilers game, or Rick Nash will walk all over them.  Let’s hope they’re motivated after that dismal performance, and inspired by the post-season around the corner.

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Goals were as follows:
Detroit: none
Columbus: Frederik Modin (Tyutin, Pahlsson)

Pluses
+ The Wings finally got things started on time.  They were alert in the first, with a good amount of jump to their game.  They seemed more engaged than I’ve seen recently, crashing and banging around.  If Mason hadn’t decided to play like his Calder-winning, Vezina-nominated self from last year, I feel like the Wings would have won.
+ I remember when Brad Stuart was given his contract extension of $3.75mil per for 4 years, some people thought it was a little on the high side.  Doesn’t look like it now, does it?  He has been worth every single penny and more this season.
+ Pavel looked more like his Datsyukian self, even though he didn’t score.  I was so certain he was going to win it in OT.
+ Ritola played 9:40, with 1:35 spent on the power play.  He got 2 SOG, 1 hit, and a takeaway.  He also drew a tripping call in the 2nd.  I thought he was good–looked motivated.  He battled for pucks along the boards, and had some good defensive moments when it came to keeping the puck in the Columbus’ zone, and a nice chance on Mason.
+ Nice to see May finally do his job and drop the gloves with Boll, who had roughed up Pavel earlier.  And Janik had a less successful fight, but still good to see him with some fire.

Minuses
- Our power play still sucks.  Couldn’t score on the 5-4, 4-3, of 5-3.
– Columbus blocked a ton of shots, but I felt like the Wings weren’t really peppering Mason with too many difficult ones, anyway.  They have absolutely got to stop with the perimeter shots, because they don’t do anything.  Babcock mentioned it during an interview with Bob Harwood on VS, and I simply can’t figure out why they’re not crashing the crease, when it’s clear that’s what they both want, and need to do.
– The Wings really got outplayed physically.  Hits were 39 to 13.
– I hate listening to Joe Beninati.  Not only does his voice make me want to stab sharp things into my eardrums, but he uses such horrid, flowery, overwrought phrases in his broadcasting.

Wings don’t play again until Thursday, back at the Joe against the Avalanche.  I’ll be there.

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Leino will be sitting in the press box tonight, because Babcock isn’t happy with his competitiveness.

Who I’m looking at to have a good game: I want to see how Ritola’s going to handle being tossed in as a replacement for Leino.  Babcock has blatantly said that “He better shoot the puck and he better not be on the outside.”

And just to note, Columbus just traded Jason Chimera to Washington for Chris Clark and Milan Jurcina, but I doubt that’s going to have any bearing on tonight’s game.

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Goals were as follows:
Detroit: Todd Bertuzzi (pp; Datsyuk, Lidstrom); Todd Bertuzzi (Rafalski, Lidstrom)
Columbus: Antoine Vermette (Voracek)

Pluses
+ I know that Bertuzzi knew Petrella was in the building when he scored that beautiful power play goal, and also jammed in the easy ricochet for the 2nd.  No curly fries, but still, a great effort.
+ My God was it great to see Valtteri Filppula back on the ice.  And not just because I’ve missed admiring his hair.  You could tell he doesn’t quite have his hands back on a couple shots that he took, but he backchecked and worked hard.  He also went 5 and 3 (63%) in the faceoff circle.  Babcock wasn’t hesitant to use him–he had 17:42 TOI (4:07 PP), with 3 shots on net.  It’s just nice to see one of the top forwards back and in action, and not have to worry about bad turnovers or defensive liabilities.
+ Hello Darren Helm!  Save of the night, this kid, batting the puck out of the net with his stick, then again with his hand to keep it tied at 1.  He also had a good game all-around, 4 SOG, 64% draws won,  2 hits, and just running around and creating energy in 16:23 TOI.
+ Good to see the Wings turn it around in the 2nd after a crappy first period.

Minuses
- What an awful first period.  I watched the Columbus post-game show, and they interviewed Nick, who was pretty blunt in saying they got off to a terrible start.  I don’t know why they can’t seem to wake up on time.
– Holy Crap, Derek Meech.  An absolutely horrendous turnover led to the Jackets’ first (and only) goal of the game.
– I don’t think Nicklas Lidstrom is going to score a goal ever again.

It’s Columbus redux on Monday, which I won’t be able to watch live.

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Edited to add goals, which I initially forgot.  Which makes me realize there were fewer points all around gathered by the Red Wings, as a lot of goals were scored off of turnovers from CBJ, which means a lot of one-assist tallies.

Goals were as follows:
Detroit: Dan Cleary (Zetterberg); Pavel Datsyuk (unassisted); Kris Draper (Lebda); Niklas Kronwall (pp; Cleary); Todd Bertuzzi (Datsyuk, Holmstrom); Ville Leino (Zetterberg, Lidstrom); Niklas Kronwall (pp; Rafalski, Bertuzzi); Justin Abdelkader (Eaves); Justin Abdelkader (May, Kronwall)
Columbus: Rick Nash (Umberger, Klesla)

Pluses
+ Dan Cleary scored the first goal of the game 1:05 into it.  This was nicely indicative of things to come.  Also nice to see that he’s off the schneid, having scored his 100th.  He had a goal and an assist tonight.
+ The first period was solid, solid hockey by the Red Wings.  They outshot Columbus 18-7 in the first 20 minutes and scored 4 goals, chasing Mason in the process.
+ And they didn’t blow the lead!
+ The power play went 2/4, both goals scored by Kronwall.  Good to see him step it up and produce.
+ Because they were so ahead in the game, the Red Wings had the luxury of resting their top two lines in the 3rd period to get them ready for tomorrow’s tail end of the back to back against Vancouver.
+ This also gave some of the kids more minutes.  Lidstrom only played 16:23, while Ericsson logged 22:48.  Datsyuk and Zetterberg had 16:09 and 16:11, respectively, and Helm and Abdelkader got 15:20 and 12:46.
+ Every Red Wings ended the night with either a plus or even +/- rating.
+ After Draper’s goal I said:  ”It’s been the 3rd goal of the season for each of the #Redwings who’ve scored so far.”  And then Kronwall scored his 3rd of the season.  To which Kris over at Snipe Snipe, Dangle Dangle, in an extraordinarily prescient statement said: “Bertuzzi and Leino can also score their 3rd of the season. Let’s do it.”  Abdelkader also got his 2nd and 3rd of the season, which brought the total to 7 Wings who scored their 3rd of the year tonight.
+ I didn’t really notice Howard a lot.  Which is a good thing, because it means I wasn’t holding my breath every time he went to make a save.
+ And that means the defense did a good job sort of… ensconcing him when the play came towards the net.
+ But I DID notice Leino, which is a good thing.
+ I really like the “Hockeytown, No Limits” commercial.

Minuses
- The Columbus stats crew.  Ken Daniels really dug into them about how they only gave the Blue Jackets 1 giveaway through the first.  The final stats were 2 giveaways, CBJ, and only 3 takeaways by Detroit.  This was clearly not accurate, if you even watched a third of the game.  Love the homer stat inflation.
– …I hope they have some firepower left for tomorrow.

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With pre-season underway, it can only mean one thing…

Hockey season is almost here.

I’ve got tickets to the Red Wings @ Rangers pre-season game on the 21st, and can hardly contain myself at the first chance this year to not only see the Wings, but also see some of the prospects.  The only prospect I’ve seen play (beyond Helm, Abdelkader), is Jordan Pearce, when he was at Notre Dame.

As a Red Wings fan stranded in New York, I’m actually going to be able to see the Wings play in person quite a few times this season.  They are making their way to the Tri-State area for back to back games in December against the Devils and then the Rangers, which I have tickets for.  And they’ll be back to play the Islanders in January.  I’ll also likely make the trip to Washington for that game a couple of weeks after they visit the Island.  And if I’m lucky, I’ll catch a game in Columbus and/or Detroit.

Drop the puck already, I don’t think I can wait any longer.

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I actually really like the Eaves signing. I was unsure what to think until I heard the terms of the deal: 1 year, $500,000. He’s a right-hand shot, which makes up for Samuelsson’s departure. A former first-round draft pick of the Ottawa Senators, I think most Red Wings fans are hoping that he turns out to be a Dan Cleary type success story. He had 20 goals in 58 games his rookie season, and has seriously tapered off since. He’s had to deal with injuries the past few seasons, and hopefully he get himself back on track in Detroit and rediscover his scoring touch.

Here are his 2008-2009 stats with the Carolina Hurricanes:

Regular					Playoffs
GP	G	A	Pts	PIM	GP	G	A	Pts	PIM
74	6	8	14	31	18	1	2	3	13

Jason Williams on the other hand… well let’s just say he has skeptics in Detroit. He’s a defensive liability, and tends to show up only occasionally. From earlier reports that the Red Wings had offered him a 1 year deal, he didn’t sound overly enthusiastic, which worries me. If he’s not motivated, how often will he bother to show up? I have to wait until I hear the price tag on this before deciding how I feel about this.

Here are his 2008-2009 stats, spent with Atlanta and Columbus:

	Regular					Playoffs
	GP	G	A	Pts	PIM	GP	G	A	Pts	PIM
Atlanta	41	7	11	18	8
Columbus	39	12	17	29	16	4	0	1	1	2

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Detroit scored, then Columbus scored. Then Detroit scored a couple, and then Columbus scored a couple. That was pretty much the story for the first two periods.

The Red Wings looked a little loose, lax on the defense, at least compared to the previous two games.

Darren Helm was an absolute wrecking ball throughout the entire series, but this game in particular. He had 8 hits. His speed is incredible and he brings so much energy to the fourth line.

Osgood was clearly hurting halfway through the second period. I was stuck watching the FS Ohio feed, but I heard later that Oz may have pulled something during Game 3, which must have been exacerbated when he was driven into the goalpost. He was slow to get up, and wasn’t moving side to side at all for the rest of the second, which makes me think groin or hip. I imagine he got a cortisone shot or something along those lines during the intermission.

The Blue Jackets announcers are awful. Absolutely awful. I overlooked it when I watched Game 3, but it’s ridiculous. They play each other 6 times a year in the regular season. I loved how their play-by-play guy was screaming that they tied the game when it was quite obviously 5-4. And suddenly Kirk Maltby turned into Kris Draper when he took the penalty. Incredible, considering Draper wasn’t even playing.

Speaking of Drapes, the Red Wings really could have used him in the faceoff circle tonight. I don’t know what it was, but they were not nearly as strong on the draws as they usually are. They went 25 to 33, advantage Columbus.

Dear Columbus fans: It’s really not cool to throw beer bottles and cups into the ice just because you don’t like a call. Real classy.

So Don, about that too many men… Oh right. So Hitch, how about that too many men on the ice penalty? I didn’t see anything controversial about the call. If you’re the guy coming onto the ice, you can’t play the puck before the other guy is off. No buts about it.

Mule is so clutch. He might be the next coming of Joe Sakic in terms of clutch playoff performances.

As much as I love the Red Wings, I am an Ohio girl and I am proud of the Blue Jackets for making the playoffs. Better luck next year, Columbus. I very much believe that you have to lose before you win, particularly in a case like this when there were a total of 4 Stanley Cup rings and 401 playoff games played in that dressing room at the start of the series.

But I also have to admit that I loved seeing the Red Wings just steamroll Columbus for the sweep. They may have tied the season series, but they just didn’t know what to expect in the post-season, and it’s clear they’re not quite ready to play with the big boys. Hitchcock had an interesting comment in his post-game press conference, which was that in the Central Division, it’s really a fight for the remaining 4 spots because it’s pretty much a given that Detroit will win the division title.

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Here’s how the West looks:

2 DETROIT sweeps 7 Columbus 4-0
3 VANCOUVER sweeps 6 St. Louis, 4-0
8 ANAHEIM is up on 1 San Jose, 2-1 (looking like it might head to 3-1)
4 Chicago is tied with 5 Calgary, 2-2

If Anaheim wins their series, that’s who Detroit will play next. If San Jose keeps from choking, Detroit will play the winner of Chicago/Calgary.

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The MSM and the bloggers all targeted Detroit’s goaltending as their big weakness, and rightfully after the showing Osgood gave during the regular season. But the one thing about Osgood is that he’s always been able to win. And he was fantastic in the first period against Columbus tonight, when the rest of the team was excited and still trying to settle down. With the parade to the penalty box by Detroit, Ozzie was calm and came up with big saves, keeping the game 0-0.

Osgood’s problem during the regular season was that he was looking too far ahead to the post-season. It’s hard to get geared up for the sixth game of the season against St. Louis when you’ve just reached the top of the world last June. But Ozzie knows that he can play when it comes to the playoffs. And he’s proven it with tonight’s game.

As for the game, it was pretty tight and physical in the first period. I think the Red Wings looked anxious and a little over-excited. Columbus seemed nervous as well, so it was sort of a sloppy period. I was not happy with all the penalties, and they were lucky Osgood was playing so strongly. I have to admit though, that Columbus did not look entirely like playoff rookies. They certainly did not make the post-season by accident.

But once Detroit regained their composure (and got a lucky goal that went in off CBJ’s Manny Malhotra’s hand), it was pure domination. Columbus did have some decent chances early in the second, but except for the one goal that was caused by an awful turnover by Kronwall right in front of the net, they weren’t able to gain much traction. Detroit got 3 goals in 5 shots on net during the bottom half of the second period. The rest of the second and the third was that beautiful shut-down defense that we were used to seeing last year when they rode the Red Machine all the way to the Cup finals.

I’m guessing this is going to go to a 5 game series. Columbus will likely win their first or second game at Nationwide Arena. But they simply can’t keep up with Detroit’s offense; the Blue Jackets are one of the lowest scoring teams in the league, at 21st during the regular season.

My thought before this series started was that Columbus had hit a slump because they were just happy to have made the playoffs. They lost the remainder of their games after they clinched a playoff spot, and I think some of the adrenaline was lost. Now I wonder if they’ll be able to regain that. I just hope that Detroit will keep the foot on the pedal and end it as soon as possible.

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