On Red Wings

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Archive for January 31st, 2010

Penguins 2, Wings 1 (SO)

Posted in Red Wings with tags , , on January 31, 2010 by Steve Klein

Henrik Zetterberg: Looks good, tastes lite.

Henrik Zetterberg: Looks good, tastes lite.

Well, you can’t beat a Sunday afternoon with Wings-Penguins for a main course and the Capitals for … an appetizer? An after dinner drink? Whatever. It’s five-plus hours of hockey on a lazy afternoon.

Game #55: 62 points, tied for 8th again with Calgary with 27 games  to go (that’s 54 points). But four teams ahead of the Wings are playing later today.

Score: Penguins 2, Wings 1 (SO)

Quote: Niklas Kronwall — “We were on our heels a little bit, I think we gave them too much respect. We have to do a way better job. It’s going to be a tough year if we keep letting 40-plus shots go past us. He (Howard) is keeping us in games.”

Unquote: Uh, you think? Too much respect? My how the worm has turned. Why do the Wings look like the teams that used to look up to them the last decade?

What I liked about the game: Jimmy Howard. I keep saying that, don’t I? But when you get outshot 47-24 (that’s 2-to-1 for you non-math majors), if you don’t like your goalie, you probably didn’t win the game. Oh, the Wings didn’t win the game. But escaping with a point hardly felt like a loss.

What I didn’t like about the game: Why does Herik Zetterberg look tired to me? Even clumsy at times. Something we don’t know?

In search of: Scoring.

What is: Wings are hanging on to playoff contention as their players return to the lineup. But just because players return, that doesn’t mean the Wings are a better team. We’re waiting for the to happen.

Mood meter: Oddly not terrible. It took Crosby and Malkin to beat the Wings on Sunday. They beat a lot of teams. Of course, that’s the Wings this year: Like a lot of teams.

Looking forward to …

Posted in Red Wings with tags on January 31, 2010 by Steve Klein

Without MVP goalie Jimmy Howard this year, the Wings are out of the playoffs.

Without MVP goalie Jimmy Howard this year, the Wings are out of the playoffs.

I’m looking forward to the Wings’s game this afternoon (12:30 p.m., NBC) with the (and it hurts to say it) Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins.

The Penguins, of course, came back from a 3-games-to-2-down deficit in the the Cup finals against the Wings with a pair of 1-goal victories, the deciding 7th in Hockeytown, to win the Cup, get the video, and the NHL’s everlasting gratitude to have Sid’s Boys and not the Wings to promote this year.

I can still see the turnovers for Brad Stuart and Michael Samuelsson that led to both of Max Talbot‘s goals in the instant replay of my mind.

Last night was one of those evenings that the currently 9th-place Wings lost ground while standing still. All the teams ahead of the Wings that played, with the exception of Chicago, won: Calgary, Nashville, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Vancouver and San Jose. At least there weren’t any 3-point games by conference rivals. Still, ouch.

The Wings aren’t going to catch Chicago or San Jose this season, and a Pacific Conference team will finish third. That means the best the Wings can hope for this season is fourth, currently eight points out of reach. To get there, the Wings will need a one of those Caps-or-Sens-like nine-game winning streaks. Possible? Yes. Probable? The Mood Meter is cloudy on that.