Big Red Machine

First things first, huge congratulations to Team USA for playing strong, tough, and with heart, and for never giving up. A great performance by the Americans to win the Silver medal. We’re proud of you all.

Secondly, congrats to Team Canada, specifically Steve Yzerman and Mike Babcock. (Can someone clarify for me whether coaches and executives get actual medals? Apparently they do not in the Summer Olympics, because then they’d have to give all coaches, like for figure skating, medals as well). I’m happy for Stevie Y, and it really did make me happy to see his jump up and cheer when Canada scored.

On that note though, did it REALLY have tp be Crosby? Of all the players… It’s probably my fault, too, because milliseconds before, I said to my brother: “If Crosby scores the GWG for Canada I’ll throw myself out the window.” And then he scored. Sigh. He was a virtual non-factor all tournament until now, and the media is all praising him as being a “leader” of Team Canada. What a joke.

Anyway, again, congrats to Finland, USA, and Canada (both mens and womens, which oddly turned out identical in terms of medal results) for their wins. And especially to Rafalski and Filppula, and Yzerman and Babcock.

Red Wings hockey starts again tomorrow, in Colorado. I’ll be at the game! Hopefully Rafalski can bring back his awesome play, and the rest of the team will get their heads into the season and ready to make a push.

Let’s go Red Wings.

I don’t think anyone was expecting that.

Seriously, do you think the Blues really thought they would return to the US with two regulation wins over Detroit?

Some other thoughts:

• Let’s just hope that being in Sweden was a bigger distraction than anticipated.  We all know Kenny Holland wasn’t hugely in favor of opening overseas, and perhaps this is why.
• Brett Lebda was positively brutal both games.  I hope he’s scratched for the home opener.
• Detroit, for all the claims of being better defensively, has rather sucked.  They’ve allowed 9 goals in 2 games.
• Comparatively, they’ve scored 6.
• I severely dislike this continued trend of falling asleep or having a meltdown in the second period.  Twice they blew leads, which lead to unanswered goal streaks by St. Louis
• Last season at least we could console ourselves with the fact that we had the best power play in the league.  Now both special teams are doing their best to fail.
• I can only hope that Osgood’s poor outing was due to his “flu-like” symptoms being worse than originally thought–he claims he’s fine. Because I’m not sure I can stomach it if both our goalies play like this all season.
• Lidstrom says the loss leaves “a sour taste” and Babcock thinks they were outplayed physically.  Cue declarations about the Wings being too soft.

I really don’t know what else to say–maybe I’m still a little stunned. I just have to keep telling myself that they’re not going to continue these trends against Chicago in a few days, another division rival.

Let’s take a quick poll:

Is anyone concerned that the Red Wings have only won 2 out of 7 pre-season games thus far? And that they’ve dropped the last 5 consecutively?

I’ll be honest: it’s a little disturbing to see the same trend that plagued the Red Wings last year rear its head again. That trend was playing 20 to 40 minutes of a game, usually either starting slow or falling asleep in the middle, and cranking it up in the third.

The goaltending I’ve seen so far also hasn’t done a whole lot to inspire confidence. Howard has been what I expected–inconsistent and not extremely solid. Larsson looked to be fighting pucks a bit the two games I’ve seen him in. McCollum looked nervous in the one I saw. Pearce has yet to play, as far as I’m aware, which is a little odd since he hasn’t been cut, either. Greg Eno wrote a piece on the promise Osgood made to never have as season like 08-09 again, and to be better prepared this year. Oz isn’t looking awesome so far. He’s certainly not playing like he did just a few months ago during the Finals, but does anyone really expect that? He knows this is pre-season, and he’s not going to blow his groin out to make a save now. But I think he’ll be ready when the puck drops for real. I believe in Oz.

What concerns me more is the defense. I watched the game they played against the Leafs on Friday, and while they iced mostly regulars, it was not Red Wings defense that I saw. Kronwall’s played about 4 or 5 games, but he still looks like he’s figuring a few things out. As is Ericsson, but that’s more expected given that he’s had fewer years of experience. Meech and Lebda are absolutely killing me and I fear for the third pairing on the back end.

Babcock knows all this, but still he’snot freaking out–too much:

“You always wonder, ‘Geez, what’s going on?’ But you just watch and see how things go.”

And Kirk Maltby makes a blindingly obviously, yet still astute comment that basically sums up what they need to do:

“…we need to start getting into regular-season mode now and not wait until a month into the season.”