Big Red Machine

The big new is that Leino has been traded to Philadelphia for a 5th round pick (yikes) and defenseman Ole-Kristian Tollefsen.  And apparently OKT has already been waived and will be headed to GR if no one claims him.  Interesting that Holland picked up another defenseman, which is not exactly what they need right now.  I mean, they don’t need anything with Franzen and hopefully Lilja coming back, but McLeod wonders if he could challenge Meech and/or Lebda for a spot on the team.  He’s only played 18 games this season, due to an injured MCL.

Back to Leino, my opinion is good riddance.  We’ve discussed Leino to death on TOV, and I’m perfectly happy to have him gone, and even more thrilled that we didn’t dump him for free.  Philadelphia can deal with him.  Maybe he’ll blossom into the player we all thought he had the potential to be in Philly–sometimes it just takes a different environment or coach, or maybe he’ll be as spectacular of a failure with the Flyers as he was in Detroit.  Here’s what Leino had to say about the trade via the Flyers’ website:

“Sometimes things don’t go as you plan it with your team,” said Leino. “The trade happened, and I am happy to be going to a good team like Philadelphia. I have heard a lot of good things about Philly and I am looking forward to playing and proving myself to Philadelphia. I am pretty happy about this trade.

“I consider myself a skilled player. My talent is more on the offensive side of the rink, but I would like to consider myself as a contributor in the defensive zone, too. I am hoping to produce some offense and help the team get some points and win games.”

So the Wings are ready to get Johan Franzen back, which is the single greatest sentence I’ve typed all season to this point.  Andreas Lilja also says he feels great after playing 2 games in Grand Rapids, and while he’ll likely play a few more, Holland will have to do some shuffling with the roster again in order to make room for him.

Onto the Kings.

They’re on an 8 game winning streak, having ripped it up on their road trip, and continue to be hot.  I’m tired of saying how important these games are for the Wings, but they are.  Calgary is 2 points ahead of Detroit and LA is 9 ahead so a regulation win would be huge.  The Wings need to channel the play they had in San Jose (with the exception of the first period) and just bring it.  Unfortunately Niklas Kronwall is still out with his tweaked knee.

Jimmy Howard is in net again, I believe.  I don’t have much to say other than Get. It. Done.

I’ll be watching some, and be intermittently on Twitter, but I’m having company over so probably not much from me in terms of a game wrap up.

Well that was certainly short-lived.  We’re back out of the playoffs, sitting at 9th.

Three unanswered goals by the Kings and they walked away with the win in a “must-win” for the Red Wings.  I officially hate this season.

Goals were as follows:
Detroit: Valtteri Filppula (Cleary, Miller); Todd Bertuzzi (Rafalski, Lidstrom)
Los Angeles: Anze Kopitar (Richardson, Simmonds); Peter Harold (Simmonds, Kopitar); Brad Richardson (Parse, Kopitar)

+ The game started out ok.  The Kings were controlling more of the play than I’d have liked to see, but I guess that was indicative of things to come.  Flip’s goal was beautiful–he showed a lot of patience with the puck, waiting out Quick before taking the shot.

+ O’Halloran had a really questionable call that led to the Wings’ 5-3, but like I’m going to complain.  Rafalski ripped a shot, and Bertuzzi deflected it in off his knee.  I remember thinking a while back that I hadn’t seen Rafalski and Lidstrom switch it up on the blueline on the power play very much this season, but that’s exactly what they did here, and it paid off.

– I don’t know what the hell Howard was thinking by not covering up the puck right in front of him when Kopitar scored.  He made the initial save, but didn’t cover the rebound and with the Kings all crashing the crease they scored.  A bunch of people on Twitter all got on Ericsson for the goal because he didn’t control the puck in the zone which led to the turnover and the chance by the Kings.  I’m not going to disagree that it was his fault on the play, but it’s not like it isn’t Howard’s, either.  I just don’t get why Howard seems to get the benefit of the doubt on goals like that when all I can think of is, if he’s covered the puck, it never would have happened.

– And has been a disturbing trend all season, the Wings didn’t have a very strong shift after the goal and allowed the Kings to carry most of the play.

– Mickey Redmond made a comment about Lilja coming back “as soon as next week.”  I don’t know if he’s been hanging out with Murph and John Keating (who I’m convinced is actually sounding drunker than Murph, if that’s even possible) at the bar beforehand, but Holland says it’s not true.

+ Stuart’s made at least 3 amazing saves this season, and he did it again tonight.  The play went to review and shocker, we actually came out as benefiters of the call.

+ I like the Miller-Filppula-Cleary line.  McCosky thinks Miller might be sticking around a bit longer, in favor of Leino.  I would certainly like to see that happen.

+ Because I’ll never stop harping on about how I think the Western Conference is tougher and deeper than the Eastern, I was amused how Babcock said in an interview “the parity on our side” when talking about the Western Conference, rather than the parity in the league.  Babs knows what’s up.  The East is a joke, as a conference.

– I saw the Harold and Richardson goals coming from a mile away.  When Harold scored the second for the Kings, all I could think was “here we go again.”

– That being said, what the hell happened to the shutdown 3rd period that the Wings used to be known for?  What happened to the vaunted defense?  They just are seemingly incapable of putting the skate to the throat and pressing down hard on games that matter.  They know these are important, right?  Why are they able to get up for games like San Jose, which, in the long run, don’t matter in the least, but they can’t things going for teams that maybe aren’t as acclaimed, but are a current challenge?  They’re not chasing SJ, not by a long shot.  They need to stop looking so far ahead and up the standings and put aside the notion that they need to show up San Jose, and instead focus on what’s right in front of them.  Which was Los Angeles.  Until they gave them a 3 point margin.  60 minutes, boys.  Come on.

– I’ve decided I don’t like it when we score a few goals early on.  The Wings just seem to sit back after that happens, and then the opposition inevitably mounts a comeback to either win or take it to OT, both of which are entirely unnecessary.

= I read an article long ago that said when people talk about their sports teams and it’s about something positive, they tend to use inclusive pronouns, like We and Us.  When they’re complaining or discussing something negative they switch to They.  It was really interesting, and I totally see myself doing it within the same paragraph (see last point).

I’m still trying to figure out exactly how I want to format my previews, so if they’ve seemed a bit ramble-y and not cohesive, that’s why.  This is also short and to the point, as I want to get some other stuff done before 7 tonight.

We’re in the playoffs, and only one point behind the Kings.  It is not exaggeration to say that this is a must-win.  2 points, in regulation.

Goaltending will be Howard vs Quick in a rematch of the last time these teams met and Howard made 51 saves.  I like to think the Wings won’t be giving up that many this time around.

Rafalski and Lidstrom have been warming up offensively; can they keep it up?

The top line of Bertuzzi-Datsyuk-Zetterberg was looking sharp and dangerous in Minnesota.  Z is looking like his normal self, and there’s some chemistry developing.

I feel like we have a zillion breakaways against Minnesota, but weren’t able to capitalize on enough.  I love that the plays are happening that we’re getting the chances, but we need to pot a few more of those.

Can the Wings play all 60 minutes hard, and not suffer a brain lapse to give the Kings a chance to win?

First off, I’ve been kind of terrible about blogging this week, but several things have chosen this moment to take over my life.  This late, the recap is kind of a moot point, but oh well.

This was a game that I mentioned on The Obstructed View that I was looking forward to this week, since the Kings have managed to surprise quite a few people with their play, and are poised to make the playoffs if they continue strong.

When I was thinking about this game, I pondered the idea of Quick, who was selected as the 3rd goalie for the US Olympic team, versus Howard, who was also in the running and obviously not picked.  The fact that my brain immediately found nothing wrong with assuming, days in advance, that it would be Howard vs Quick is really indicative of the goaltending situation in Detroit.  Sorry, Oz.

- Apparently it’s all Lebda’s fault that Holmstrom’s foot is broken.  Way to go, Brett.

+ It was imperative that the Wings won this game in regulation to prevent the Kings from gaining a point.  Prior to the game the Kings were 5 points ahead; now they’re 3.  The Wings have got to gain ground against Western Conference teams if they want to be in control of their post-season chances and not leave it to fate that a team of ahead will have a second-half meltdown and fall out of the standings.

- Murph pointed out that it’s all Swedes who are injured, plus Williams.  All of the Swedes except Lidstrom have been on IR at some point this year.  That terrifies me.

+ Welcome back to the lineup, Dan(ny) Cleary.  He took over Homer’s role, planting himself in front of Quick, whacking it in with 0.2 left in the first period.  See boys and girls?  Good things happen when you go to the net.

+ My God was it good to see him and Zetterberg back out on the ice.  Zetterberg didn’t really do a ton, but he’s getting a pass for now because just having him out was a relief.

+ Cheers Rafalski for saving an almost goal by Ryan Smyth, who had a wide open net earlyish in the 2nd

+ Wings had a great PK on the Datsyuk interference call.  The Wings seemed to get about as many chances on the PK as the Kings did with the man advantage.

= Howard had a ridiculous game, in more than one sense of the word.  On one hand, he was played pretty scrambly, with a few too many snow-angel saves for my comfort.  He had quite a few poor rebounds and would have been scored on due to his turnover early in the first of Rafalski hadn’t bailed him out.  I feel like most of the mad flurries in front of the net were because he either didn’t stop it in the first place, or didn’t control the rebound well.  He almost gave me a heart attack several times.  And sorry, but I don’t know what he was thinking on the Kings goal–trying to catch the pass I suppose, but he left the left side wide open for Ryan Smyth to pop it in.

On the other hand, he was lucky to the point of obnoxious, stopping the 27 shots that the Kings put on net in the 2nd.  He lost his stick at one point, was scrambling and sliding around, everyone was in the crease, and he still managed to save them.  He had the luck of I don’t even know what.  I realize you make your own luck by playing well, but I’m really with Matt on this that I’d prefer to see him more settled and in control of the puck.  At the same time, 51 is really effing incredible and there’s zero questioning that.  There are no points for style, as long as you get the job done, and by god he did.  My blood pressure would probably improve, though.

I’m not just ready to proclaim him the Messiah, yet.  Another note, putting aside the idea that Osgood needs/wants starts so that he can get on a roll, how about giving Howard a rest?  He’s starting against San Jose in what will be his 8th straight.  He’s young and he’s got the Olympic break to rest, but he’s still got potential for burnout.

- The Kings controlled the majority of the game and put 57 shots on net.  57.  That cannot happen.

- Did Leino play?  I don’t really remember seeing him at all.  This also may be because I watched the Yahoo feed, which was terrible quality, but I simply couldn’t tolerate listening to the Kings announcers.  But really, I think I didn’t notice Leino because he didn’t contribute to the game whatsoever.

+ Darren Helm is my Hero.  The key was that he zipped up the ice to not allow Quick to play the puck, gained possession, and whacked it in.  With a couple of minutes remaining, I wrote on Twitter, “Shit, we need 2 in regulation here, boys. Can’t afford to give LAK anything. We can’t afford OT, do you hear??”.  I’m convinced that message was transmitted directly to Darren Helm’s brain and then he scored.

Screw the preview.

R. S. V.

Homer’s out 3-4 weeks with a fractured foot, per Khan.

I knew it was too good to be true, that we were starting to get people back and soon we’d have a full roster again.  Fluke accident during practice.  Seriously.

So the big news that’s already been flying around the blogosphere and the Twitterverse is that Zetterberg and Cleary are making their glorious returns to the lineup.  And for the first time in what feels like an eon, there will be two complete top lines, that actually look like top two lines.  The circus is in town, and Flip and Dan(ny) will be playing with Bertuzzi.

Ville’s in the press box, along with the true leader of the team, Brad May.

In an odd turn of events, Babcock has chosen to play Jimmy Howard tonight against the Kings, rather than follow his pattern from earlier in the season where he swapped goalies after a bad game.