Wings Survive Epic Meltdown, Tie Series with OT Win

If you like roller-coasters, last night's game in Anaheim was a treat for you.

The Red Wings, already down 1-0 in their 1st round series against the Ducks, spotted themselves what should've been a comfortable 3-goal lead, but were forced into Overtime after a full-team collapse the magnitude of which I have rarely--if ever--seen from this club.  After going up 4-1, Detroit completely imploded in the 3rd period, surrendering 3 goals in the span of roughly 10 minutes to allow the Ducks to force extra time.  The Wings would nip their Duck problem in the bud, though, and survive to win 5-4 in OT.

Some credit is due to Anaheim, insofar as they didn't quit, but had the Wings kept playing the way they had in the first hlaf of the game they never would've found themselves in the tight spot that they did.  Playoffs or no, you go up 4-1 on a club, you should win the game comfortably.  This was far from comfortable.

Johan Franzen led the offense with a pair of goals for Detroit, while Justin Abdelkader and Damien Brunner also chipped in with goals in regulation.  Gustav Nyquist would be the one to provide the OT heroics, scoring on a PP just 1:21 into the extra frame.

Goaltender Jimmy Howard was...good--not great, but good.  He fought the puck far less last night than he did in Game 1, but still gave up a couple softies that could've also prevented this game from getting to Overtime.

Down at the other end, Anaheim goalie Jonas Hiller was slow to show up to Game 2, but sealed the wall up in the 3rd after the 2nd Franzen goal, and made critical saves to keep the Ducks in it.  One particular save on Valtteri Filppula would've been in the net on most nights, but Hiller somehow got over to rob Flip and give his team momentum just before the Ducks tied the game at 4 apiece.

On the injury front, Todd Bertuzzi played last night, his 1st game back since going out with back issues early in the season, and what is probably the biggest--and baddest--news out of Game 2 is that young phenom Danny DeKeyser has been diagnosed with a broken thumb and is done for the year.  He will likely be replaced with either Carlo Colaiacovo or Ian White, as coach Mike Babcock will probably go with experience over the younger Brian Lashoff.

The series now shifts back to Hockeytown, and if the Wings can steal the show at home, they'll be sitting pretty to wrap up Round 1.  Game 3 starts tomorrow night at 7:30 ET.

Wings Waste Game 1 with Sloppy Performance

The Detroit Red Wings may have misconstrued the phrase, "What happens in the regular season doesn't matter in the playoffs".  I say this because we sure as hell did not see the team of last week on the ice for Game One of Detroit's opening playoff series against the Anaheim Ducks,  What we got was garbage, from top to bottom: a lackluster, undisciplined showing that was not in line with what one expects of a team in the playoffs.

One of the biggest concerns of the night had to be the penalties.  Terrible decisions made at the worst possible times hampered any chance Detroit had to get any sort of early rhythm going, and made it impossible to really turn the tide as the game went on.  Anaheim opened the night's scoring on a powerplay goal spawned from a moronic cross-check by Jordin Tootoo in front of the Wings' net, literally seconds after we dodged a massive bullet where Detroit should have been called for a penalty, but wasn't.

The Red Wings' only goal of the night followed, on what can only be described as a 'lucky bounce', Jakub Kindl, in what may have been the only smart thing he did all night, shot the puck toward the net, and the puck deflected off of Dan Cleary's body and past Anaheim goalie Jonas Hiller.

From there, it was much of the same: Bad passes, terrible exits from the defensive zone getting stymied in the neutral zone, one-and-dones once the Wings finally DID breach the O-zone.  No sustained pressure. At all.  Even Detroit netminder Jimmy Howard was off his game tonight.  Don't misunderstand me though, he did his job and gave Detroit a fighting chance, but almost every stop that Howard made looked forced.  He fought the puck all night long, it seemed, and never truly got settled in, which may have further unsettled the skaters in front of him.

The young guys played like young guys tend to in the Playoffs: trying too hard, trying to force things that weren't there, and just generally not making smart, simple plays.  Take Kindl for example.  With a chance to hammer the down down the ice, he decides to get cute and try to bank the puck off the glass in his own zone...and totally misses the glass.  Delay of game penalty ensues, Ducks take the lead on another PPG early in the 3rd.

Everything kept slipping downhill from there, with the Wings gradually losing what little grip they still had on the game.  A few chances cropped up here and there, but Hiller was square to the task of shutting our minimal offense down for the rest of the match.  Add to that an empty netter from the Ducks' own zone, and it was the icing on the suck-cake.

So with the first game squandered, it's now up to Detroit to learn what they may from the loss, adapt, and move on.  They can still split the road pair and come out strong at home in Games 3 and 4.  This series is far from over, but Detroit needs to make performances like the one tonight disappear from their future matches.

Don't Believe the Odds, Detroit will be Dangerous

The Wings begin their quest toward the Stanley Cup tonight in Game 1 of their first round series against the Anaheim Ducks, but while Detroit's late-season push to make it in was extremely impressive, many analysts and odds-makers obviously don't believe that means much.  The majority of the hockey world sees the Red Wings as longshot to win the Cup in comparison to teams like Chicago and Pittsburgh, but I wouldn't count out a team whose last-second revival was of sleeping-giant-proportions.

Let's take a look at the last week, shall we?  Over the course of four games, Detroit decimated each and every team they faced, starting with the Phoenix Coyotes, who at the time were hot on Detroit's heels looking to overtake the Wings for a playoff spot.  They were pounded 4-0 for their efforts.

Next came the defending champs, the Los Angeles Kings.  LA jumped out to a 1-0 lead and everyone expected the worst.  Instead, Detroit rallied back, roaring past the Kings with three unanswered goals to win 3-1.

Then, it was the Nashville Predators, a team out of playoff hopes, but still with a chance to play giant-killer to a hated division rival.  The game was fiercely contested for the first 20 minutes, but after that, it was all Detroit, exploding for four goals to go from down 2-1 to winning 5-2.

Finally, in the critical final game of the season, Detroit faced another would-be dream killer in Dallas.  The Stars could also potentially crush the Wings hopes for Playoff glory by so much as taking a single point from the Wings.  The Red Wings weren't interested in that, however, and came to win, dominating the Stars 3-0 to lock up the 7th seed.

And now, here we are opening the 2012-13 playoffs against an Anaheim team we took to task in a back-to-back showdown just over a month ago.  In the Stanley Cup Playoffs, anything is possible if you work for it.  But go ahead, lay the odds against the Wings.  I'm sure they're just fine with that, and they'll let their play determine the real odds.

Red Wings / Ducks series preview: Ducks vs Dynasty

The Red Wings have made it into their 22^nd playoffs in a row by playing their best hockey in their last 5 games of the season, they’ll have to play the same dominating hockey if they want to win against the Ducks.

Since April 12^th, the Red Wings have gone 5-1-2 for 12 points out of a possible 16 points. But the most important stats for me is the goaltending: Jimmy Howard played in 13 games in the month of April and finished 7-3-3 with a 1.44 GAA (2^nd for goalies who played 10 games or more, only behind Elliot who had outstanding results) and .942 SV% (3^rd for goalies who played 10 games or more), plus he had 3 shutouts. In other words, Jimmy is on the top of his game at the right time, and so is the Red Machine. Special teams are firing on all cylinders, with the PP firing at 21 % and the PK stellar, with a 91 %. The standard for special teams is supposed to be PK + PP = 100 %, so the Wings are going strong. And most importantly, the Red Wings outscored their opponents 23 to 11 along these 8 games.

Now enough about the Wings, what about the Ducks?

Since April 10^th, the Ducks have gone 4-3-1 for 9 points out of a possible 16 points and were outscored 19 to 17 over that span. The Fasth and Hiller duo did respectfully well, with Fasth starting 9 games and going 4-3-1 with a 2.02 GAA and a .925 SV% with two shutouts. Hiller went 3-2-0 with 1.94 GAA and .931 SV%. Getzlaf (11 points), Perry (8 points) and Palmieri (8 pts) did ok in April, but Selanne and Ryan have been cold.

But enough about the un-sexy stats, what about the head-to-head stats? The Red Wings won 2 out of the 3 meetings against the Ducks this year, with Miller notching the game-winner on the 1^st Red Wings win and Datsyuk getting the GWG on the second one. Andrew Cogliano got the GWG for the Ducks on the first meeting of the season. For the all-time stats, Detroit has won the playoff series three times (1997, 1999 and 2009) while Anaheim has won two times (2003 and 2007)

The two teams are evenly matched and have animosity, with the Datsyuk – Perry fight being the best part of it. I really think Detroit's depth matches Anaheim's goaltenders and Detroit wins this one in 6. Here's hoping.