By Alexander Monaghan
President

Just 11:14 into Tuesday nights tilt between the St. Louis Blues and Detroit Red Wings, forward Chris Stewart would drive defenseman Niklas Kronwall into the boards. The hit, which was several feet away from the boards, came from behind and was therefore given the appropriate checking from behind major and game misconduct.

See for yourself, Kronwall had close to no way of protecting himself from becoming a human accordion.

Stewart could face further disciplinary action from NHL disciplinarian Brendan Shanahan even though Kronwall would later return to the ice. While the hit appears clear cut, Blues captain David Backes felt the punishment fit the crime. From St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

“Kronwall comes back,” Backes said. “(Stewart) has already been penalized for five (minutes) and missing the game … a five-minute power play against Detroit can be a death sentence. I don’t know. You look at the criteria put forth. (Stewart) has never been suspended before, never had a hearing before. Kronwall looks injured on the play, but he comes back. Is it an ugly hit? Yeah, it’s not pretty. But he’s a hard-nosed guy that has to play with that edge to be effective out there.”

We can certainly understand where Backes is coming from. Stewarts’ clean record could help him out when it comes to judgment day — Stewie holds 209 NHL games on his NHL resume. Then again, just because someone never committed a dirty play in the past doesn’t necessarily mean they are incapable of doing so.

As usual with questionable plays and suspensions we leave a vote to the user, who can help guide us through this much debated topic.

The 12th annual Toast of Hockeytown took place at Joe Louis Arena on Wednesday evening. What’s the Toast of Hockeytown, you ask? It’s a charity event benefiting the Detroit Red Wings Foundation. What does it entail? The ice at The Joe being turned into a swanky club with food around the boards, a silent auction area in the middle, a live band playing at one end, and almost a dozen tables set up for wine tasting.

And the Red Wings team is there as well.

Now, my brothers (Matt and Mike) and I, being the huge hockey fans we are, have been wanting to do this for several years now. Our problem has been that I’ve been under 21 years of age, since it’s a wine tasting event. This was the first year we could finally go.

Getting a one-on-one (or three-on-one with Matt and Mike there, too) with the players, how could I not ask them a question I’ve always wanted to know:

Outside of Joe Louis Arena, what’s your favorite arena to play in?

Johan Franzen was the first player we talked to, congratulating him on his hat trick in the previous game. “Favorite place to play? Probably Colorado,” he told us. It makes sense, of course, since he scored more goals than the entire team in the 2008 Western Conference semi-finals. “There are a lot of fun places, though,” he added.

Justin Abdelkader, Patrick Eaves, and Darren Helm all said Chicago for the National Anthem (and the Original Six rivalry). Helm added, “Montreal is fun, too. And I’m excited for Winnipeg,” though the Red Wings won’t visit there until next season.

I startled Valtteri Filppula with my question. He didn’t have an immediate answer for me, and it took him a fair amount of time to come up with an answer. “Calgary,” he told me. We also asked him what he thinks Nicklas Lidstrom‘s chances are for winning the Norris Trophy this year. His face lit up and he laughed a bit. “Ohoh! Pretty good! If he keeps playing like this… it’s unbelievable.”

Then it was Pavel Datsyuk‘s turn. You think he’s hard to understand in interviews? Try an arena with a loud, live band playing and hundreds of people talking. Matt told him, “Hands down, you are the most entertaining player to watch in the NHL.” Datsyuk chuckled, gave a noncommittal shrug, and said, “Thank you. I try harder.”

When asked about his favorite arena in which to play, he said, “Old Pittsburgh. Mellon. But now it’s new… they all similar. Big, fans far away, lots of lights.” He mentioned another old arena that isn’t play in anymore, but couldn’t recall the name.

We asked him what he thought Lidstrom’s chances were for the Norris. He smiled and said, “He should have retired eight years ago. But he win seven of them, so…”

Tomas Holmstrom took fake offense to my question, mostly because I started out by saying, “Okay, Homer, you’ve been in the league a long time…” I patched things up between us, though, and he said he enjoys Toronto and Montreal for the fans.

“So you’d favor a move to the Eastern Conference?” asked Matt.

“Oh, for sure,” Homer said. “Right now, we always have to leave the time zone to plan an opponent.”

Henrik Zetterberg said he enjoys Chicago for the Original Six rivalry. “The fans recognize me on the street and give me a hard time,” he said with a laugh. Unlike a place like St. Louis or Columbus where “we’re just left alone to do our thing.” Of course, this is all null and void anywhere in Canada.

A few weeks ago, various Red Wings players visited local businesses around the Metro Detroit area. Datsyuk ended up serving coffee at a Tim Horton’s drive-thru. Start watching this video around a minute in, and you’ll see Zetterberg drive up in his car and ask where his coffee is. So I had to ask, “How much fun was it to drive through the drive-thru at Tim Horton’s when Datsyuk was working?”

Zetterberg started laughing. “Oh yeah. I was really hoping he was the ‘Welcome to Tim Horton’s’ guy, you know, just so you couldn’t understand him. And then I wanted to order fourteen coffees…”

Jonathan Ericsson took a different approach with his answer and said anything out west is good. “Mostly because it’s warm, so we can see the sun in the winter,” he explained. he also enjoys Florida, though the Wings don’t travel there often. Also, he told me he was 6’4,” and I’m pretty sure he’s lying.. I’m 5’8″, and he makes me look ridiculously tiny.

And then, of course, there’s the man himself. Nicklas Lidstrom. The wait to meet him was longest, by far, but absolutely worth it. Of course, the three of us had met him last season at the Season Ticket Holder Open House, but when he’s behind a table and you’re being ushered forward, it’s hard to carry on a conversation.

Obviously, you don’t walk up to him and ask him what he thinks his chances are of winning the Norris. I shook his hand heartily and grinned at him. While he signed my program, I asked, “You’ve been in the league for a while, so I’m curious – what’s your favorite arena to play in, aside from the Joe?”

“Oh, the Shark Tank!” Lidstrom told me immediately.

“Well, it does have an awesome name,” I agreed.

“Yeah, and the fans are always so loud,” he added. And with playing the past two postseasons there, I’m sure he’s grown a little fond of the place, even if the team ticks off almost every single Red Wings fan.

By far, the best conversation of the evening was with Niklas Kronwall. Matt, Mike, and I all had a different question to ask him or a comment to tell him. “If you’re willing to divulge this information, where did you get your glasses?” Mike asked.

“Polo Ralph Lauren,” Kronwall told him, laughing. “But it wasn’t in Detroit.” He told us he doesn’t wear them anymore; he had Lasik surgery at the end of this past season.

Matt asked the standard favorite arena question. “Montreal for their fans,” Kronwall said. “Calgary, too. Vancouver has a nice atmosphere. …And Nashville! Because they have so many fans.”

“Yeah…we’re not a fan of those games because of some of the chants they do,” Mike said.

Kronwall chuckled. “I can see that.”

Mine was a little more personal, and a bit of an anecdote. “Okay, I have to tell you…” is how I started it all. “Our neighbors set up an ice rink in their backyard every winter. And when we shovel it, we push all the snow to one side and stack it up so we can check people into it.” I looked at Kronwall. “We named it after you.”

“Really?!” he asked.

“Yes. It’s the KronWall of Check,” I told him.

“That’s amazing!” he exclaimed, absolutely ecstatic.

In other interesting facts, Drew Miller talks with brother Ryan a couple times a week. You know, just in case you ever wondered.

We asked Ian White how he likes playing for Detroit, and he said he’s glad he came here. He said he’s not fond of the twenty minute drive down to Joe Louis Arena from where he’s currently living; he was used to a five minute drive back in San Jose.

By far, the most talkative, friendly players were Eaves, Kronwall, Zetterberg, and Holmstrom. Datsyuk was, too, in his broken English way.

To learn cool little facts about the players and have one-on-one, almost private conversations with them was a treat. If your respective NHL team has anything like this, I say do it. While you may be able to go every year, it still feels like a once in a lifetime opportunity. And it’s an evening you will never forget.

Christina Roberts
NHLHS Detroit Red Wings Correspondent
Twitter: @franzenmuth
Email: christina.roberts@nhlhotstove.com

Let’s leave the “What’s wrong with the Detroit Red Wings?” question at the door right now before we even start. That’s another article completely.

Many Red Wings fans were given good news on Halloween when the turned on their computers and went online and/or opened up the sports section of a newspaper and saw that Ken Holland worked his magic again:

Niklas Kronwall remains a Red Wings defenseman for seven more years.

And why wouldn’t he? He was given the title of “Alternate Captain” this season, swapping out with Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik Zetterberg. The Red Wings need that physical kind of force on their ranks, and keeping Kronwall around is a smart move. Plus, with Nicklas Lidstrom on his way out at some point in the future, the team needs some defensemen on which they can rely and not have to worry about re-signing every other year.

Kronwall signed for seven years, $33.25 million; at thirty years of age, this lengthy contract pretty much guarantees he’ll be wearing a Winged Wheel for his entire career, unless otherwise traded. His contract gets a little tricky. The salary cap hit will be $4.75 million, but the breakdown is more intricate than that (naturally).

2012-13 sees him making $4.25 million. The following three seasons, he ears $6 million, then $5.5 million in 2016-17, and the last two years of his contract will be $3.5 million and $1.75million.

Kronwall will earn $4.25 million in 2012-13 and $6 million in each of the next three seasons. He’ll make $5.5 million in 2016-17 and $3.5 million and $1.75 million, respectively, the final two years of the deal.

With a cap hit of $4.25 million, it puts him in the same ranks as Chris Pronger, Kevin Bieksa, Mike Komisarek, Dan Hamhuis, Jack Johnson, and Tomas Kaberle, to name only a handful.

So how does Niklas Kronwall compare statistically with these other defensemen?

Firstly, he’s always been fairly prone to lengthy injuries (one to two months of the season); the 2008-2009 season only saw him missing two games and getting 51 points and 50 PIMs. 2010-11, he only missed five games and hit 47 points and 36 PIMs. Twelve games into the season, he has two goals and two assists, though let’s not forget the Red Wings went through a six-game slump of only scoring six goals total.

Now let’s compare these stats to some of the previously mentioned defensemen. Kronwall’s stats are fairly similar to Pronger’s, if you can believe it. However, Pronger has come close in several recent seasons to hitting sixty points whereas Kronwall still struggles to hit fifty. Last season, Pronger only played fifty games, but still scraped up 25 points, almost identical to Kronwall’s 48 game, 22-point season.

Against a player like Bieksa, Kronwall has more offensive output (and a lot fewer penalties), with Bieksa’s highest offensive season coming in 2008-9 with 43 points. The same goes with comparing him to Komisarek and Hamhuis.

Kronwall is also pretty identical to Jack Johnson, both in offensive output and penalties. They both get around 35 to 45 points per season and hit somewhere around 40 PIMS.

His comparison to Kaberle is very similar to that of Pronger. Kaberle hits anywhere between forty and sixty points per season while keeping his penalties to a minumum. One thing is for sure, Kaberle really hasn’t missed a majority of a season like Kronwall has in the past. But if the Swede can stay healthy and aggressive, anything is possible.

Now after comparing all of these stats, would you find it strange to compare Kronwall’s output to Pronger’s output? People usually rank Pronger up there with Lidstrom, Zdeno Chara, and Shea Weber, but Kronwall gets lost in the mix, and is usually only known for his bone-crunching hits. Well, it all started from the scouting level…

As Hakan Andersson, the director of European scouting for the Red Wings, once said, “I know one scout who tried to bring up Niklas Kronwall’s name with his team. They just laughed at him. They never even had a serious dialogue. They just stopped him. They said ‘a 5-11 Swedish defenceman?’ [The Red Wings] organization is more open-minded than that.”

But the Red Wings like their players to be under the radar and overlooked.

Christina Roberts
NHLHS Detroit Red Wings Correspondent
Twitter: @franzenmuth
Email: christina.roberts@nhlhotstove.com

San Jose Sharks vs. Detroit Red Wings
By Stephanie Lee and Christina Roberts

It’s that time of year again for the fans of the San Jose Sharks to once again pull out their tin foil hats and watch their team face the Detroit Red Wings.  Why you ask do they need tin foil hats? The Detroit Red Wings are the New York Yankees of the National Hockey League. They are virtually untouchable.

Moving on…..

We are looking at a highly anticipated rematch between these two teams. Last season, the Sharks and Red Wings faced off in the second round with the Sharks coming out the victor winning 4-1. Granted, neither team is a carbon copy of last season, losing and acquiring new and key players. Most notably the loss of Evgeni Nabokov for the Sharks, while the Red Wings picked up former division foe Mike Modano.

But what exactly is it that will have the Sharks winning this series? It’s obviously not our stellar goaltending, as we saw in the LA series – Antti Niemi went 4-2 with 3.99 GAA and .863 SV% . Could it be our amazing scoring? Twenty one goals scored by 8 different members of the Sharks. Ryane Clowe picking up 4 of those with Joe Pavelski adding 3 of his own. I’m just not quite sure it will be that amazing talent we are harnessing. Maybe it’s our special teams, you know, with our 8th ranked penalty kill (79.2%). The Sharks have killed off 17 out of 22 possible PKs, allowing the Kings to score only five power play goals.

Although, it just might be Detroit’s year to beat San Jose in this semi finals match up. They practically beat down Phoenix by sweeping them 4-0 in the first round, and all without left winger Henrik Zetterberg. Zetterberg has been out since April 7th with an ankle injury and is prepared to return to the lineup for this series. His 24 goals and 56 assists really makes him an asset for the Wings. Not that they don’t have other capable players to do the job. In fact, they have the amazingly talented Pavel Datysuk, whose 6 points leads the team this postseason. And let’s be real, Jimmy Howard with the .920 SV% and 2.5 GAA.  Don’t count out the Wings and their special teams either, and I’m not talking about their penalty kill (16th in the playoffs at 66.7%); it’s more about their power play: Top 5 on the list, sitting pretty at 4th with 26.7%.

Obviously these teams know what they are doing and what they need to correct. There’s nothing about this series that will be a piece of cake. Detroit has had over a week off and is well rested. They will be roaring and ready to go. I am expecting Game 1 to be full energy, high impact, right from the drop of the puck.

Players you need to watch out for in this series would be Ryane Clowe on San Jose. His four playoff goals leads the Sharks.

I call it San Jose in 7. And that’s only because I am a Sharks fan who is realistic about the strength of the Wings.

Stephanie Lee
NHLHS San Jose Sharks Correspondent
Twitter: @OhMySwed3

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It’s the same second round matchup as last season. For the Red Wings, this must feel like a crazy case of déjà vu, having the same two first rounds as 2010; for San Jose, they must know that despite the similarities between the two seasons, this will not be the same battle as last year.

So why can Detroit win this series? Last year, this team took the Phoenix Coyotes to seven games and immediately after winning, flew to San Jose to play a day and a half later. This year, this team swept Phoenix and has had a week to sit back and watch the rest of the playoffs. This week-long break has given then two key players returning for this second round: Johan Franzen and Henrik Zetterberg. Their return could be pivotal; just look at how well the Red Wings fared last round missing Franzen for one game and Zetterberg for all four.

San Jose’s roster is full of a lot of big, physical players. The Red Wings are known as a not super violent European team. The feisty nature of players like Justin Abdelkader, Niklas Kronwall, and especially Todd Bertuzzi (Drew Miller could be thrown in here, too; he gets in some scraps) will be prevalent to help deter San Jose from roughing up star players like Zetterberg and Datsyuk. Bertuzzi was a key physical player in the first round and if he can keep that up, it would only be a good thing.

But as optimistic as I’d like to be, I have to look at some of the negatives as well.

Remember last year’s matchup and how many five-on-threes the San Jose Sharks had? Remember last round with how many penalties the Red Wings took and how many power play goals Phoenix had? The penalty box will be our downfall. Likewise, if Tomas Holmstrom doesn’t watch himself, I can see his butt being the cause of at least two goals being called off due to “goalie interference” on Niemi.

And while the week of rest may be a good thing for this team, it could also hurt them; game one will show whether rust has formed on the players or if getting back Zetterberg and Franzen will energize them enough. They seem to be mentally in the zone, but I think a week of rest for any team will cause some miniature downfalls.

This is a team that has that imaginary, impossible switch to suddenly play focused, intense playoff hockey. If any team can shake off rust spots after eight days off, it’s the Red Wings.

And since Stephanie made her prediction, I might as well do the same. I’m going with Red Wings in six, though I wouldn’t be surprised if it gets drawn out to seven.

Christina Roberts
NHLHS Detroit Red Wings Correspondent
Twitter: @franzenmuth
Email: christina.roberts@nhlhotstove.com

When it’s an Original Six matchup with one of the Canadian teams, you know you’re going to be in for a treat.

The “Go Leafs Go!” chant by Toronto Maple Leafs fans was already being chanted out in the concourse as soon as I walked in. It was even louder in the eighteen minutes before the national anthem. The contrasting “Let’s Go Red Wings!” then “Go Leafs Go!” (video here!) started up when the Leafs fan behind my friends and I said the following:

“This game is going to be amazing.”

To which we turned around and said, “That is the understatement of the year right there!”

An octopus hit the ice as Karen Newman sang the last few notes of the National Anthem, and from the drop of the puck, electricity ran through the crowd. I knew a lot of Leafs fans would be in attendance since Joe Louis Arena is so close to the bridge and tunnel to Windsor, but I was surprised to find about 2/3 of the upper bowl wearing blue jerseys.

Two of the best fan signs spotted last night were several sections over from me, both held by Leafs fans. The first was a banner that said “Optimus Reime,” and a goalie mask morphed so it looked like the Transformers symbol. But the one that had my brothers, our friend, and I cracking up was in the very top row, a simple blue and white posterboard that said “Take Back Lebda.”

Henrik Zetterberg kicked off the scoring just five minutes into the game on a power play. Even with a 1-0, it didn’t deter the energy of all the Leafs fans in the arena; if anything, it made them louder.

They got their wish. With two minutes left in the first, Nazem Kadri netted Toronto’s first goal. Scoring didn’t resume until nearly halfway through the second period when Tomas Holmstrom tipped in Niklas Kronwall‘s shot on the Wings’ second power play of the game.

Of course, on the fourteenth anniversary of the epic “Fight Night at The Joe” (you know, the giant bloodbath between the Red Wings and Colorado Avalanche), the evening wouldn’t be complete without a fight or two. Justin Abdelkader and Darryl Boyce dropped the gloves with less than five minutes to go in the second period, to the delight of everyone in attendance (video here! I was quite busy last night.)

But it didn’t stop there. Around three minutes to go in the second period, my section and the section to my left in the upper bowl (as well as the two in the lower bowl) all stood up: A fight had broken out between two fans in the lower bowl.

My brother’s immediate reaction? Pick me up and stand me on the seats in front of us so I could get pictures. There wasn’t much to see, honestly. A rough circle was formed around wherever the fight was, and I saw a guy in a Darren McCarty jersey leave that area. When things started to die down, my brother sat me back down on the floor and everyone started to sit back down only to stand back up because another fight had broken out.

So everyone in our sections completely missed the fact that the second period was cut short to repair glass in the corner; we were more interested in the brawls (hey, it was my first hockey-fan brawl witnessed in person). I found out later through a friend that ten people were ejected from the game – five Red Wings fan and five Leafs fans.

Then things got annoying. Toronto’s second goal came just six minutes into the third period from Joffrey Lupul. As you can see from the picture over there, he was pretty much laying on top of Jimmy Howard, got a stick on his own rebound and niftily shot it into the empty net. All the while sitting on top of Howard. Lupul made the comment after the game that he didn’t think he was in the crease. Well, you’re still sitting on the goaltender.

And yet the goal wasn’t called off due to goaltender interference. There was no penalty. Toronto had tied the game. Their fans were practically jeering at us while we watched the replay on the jumbotron and yelled, “What the #*$&?!”

Because we all know if that had been Tomas Holmstrom, the goal would have been waived off and he would have gotten a two-minute penalty on top of that.

Not to mention that Howard left the game right after that, shaken up/injured. Joey MacDonald was in between the pipes, coming in for Howard in the middle of play for the second game in a row. News has come out today that no serious injury came to Howard; it’s just bruised/sprained, and he could be back in action as early as Wednesday.

Regardless, barely thirty seconds later, Jiri Hulder took a slap shot from the hash marks that went in. I will admit that I immediately jumped to my feet and screamed, “Suck it!” as loud as I could (and my throat still hurts today). I wasn’t angry at the fans around us (though they were a tad bit irritating); I was angry that Toronto’s last goal had counted.

Todd Bertuzzi pulled the final trigger on Toronto’s playoff hopes when he got an empty-netter at the end of the game to seal the Red Wings’ 4-2 victory.

Every Original Six game so far this season has been extremely entertaining, especially against the Canadian teams we rarely get to see. The final game (for me, at least) is Monday against the Chicago Blackhawks. With Chicago trying to seal their playoff spot, it should be just as intense.

As an aside, I recently did a fan profile questionnaire for Hockey Blogette, a Red Wings blog. If you’re interested in the hilarity, you can read it right HERE.

Christina Roberts
NHLHS Detroit Red Wings Correspondent
Twitter: @franzenmuth
Email: christina.roberts@nhlhotstove.com

The Detroit Red Wings had a three-goal lead in the third period of Saturday night’s game against the Phoenix Coyotes. It was at that point when I nearly turned off the television and went to bed (I had to get up early for work Sunday morning). But I refrained, knowing anything could happen.

They say it’s the most dangerous lead in the NHL, being up by three goals. The leading team can sit back a little bit and watch the clock run down to zero. So the opposition gets a goal — who cares? They still have to score two more after that. The point is that three goals can make the team in the lead stop playing and suddenly, their three-goal lead is gone.

The Red Wings learned this the hard way. But you would think they would know by now.

Red Wings fans are scrambling to find answers to why the team’s play has been so poor as of late. The team is 5-3-2 in their past ten outings. They won five in a row earlier, but have dropped the last three in a row (though two of those were in overtime/shootout).

Jonathan Ericsson has been playing…poor. Most of the time, I try to give him the benefit of the doubt, but there were two separate times in Saturday’s game where he just seemed to freeze; both times, it turned into Phoenix goals. Likewise, Niklas Kronwall seems to be off his game for the past few weeks. He needs to get Kronwalled to knock some sense back into him.

Don’t take any credit away from the Coyotes, though, by saying the Red Wings gave up; the Coyotes fought the entire time. They never fell behind by more than three goals, even with a fluke goal by Drew Miller that started off the scoring just minutes into the game. Phoenix wholeheartedly deserved those two points.

But I’m one to focus on the positives, even in a loss that had me going to bed angry and sleeping horribly because I was so distressed (it was the two posts in the shootout that got me). So here are some positives that came out of that:

Nicklas Lidstrom had two assists in the game to bring his overall career points total to a whopping 1,100. Not bad for a forty-year-old defenseman who’s in contention for his seventh Norris trophy.

Darren Helm may have scored the most beautiful goal of his career. Good to see that coming from a guy who’s struggled the whole season with finishing on his breakaways.

The Red Wings are now 23-0-4 when leading after two periods.

The running joke amongst Red Wings fans who watch the games on FSDetroit is that Larry Murphy, the man usually between the benches (and the defenseman from back in the day) is constantly eating hot dogs. If you’ve watched a broadcast, you more than likely heard him mention $1 hot dog night at Joe Louis Arena. Well, during the second intermission of last night’s game, everyone witnessed Murph take a bite out of a hot dog on camera. The Twitterverse exploded. And the comic I drew of Murph during the Winter Classic was relevant once again.

And remember when four-time Lady Byng winner Pavel Datsyuk started the season out with 5 PIMs? Sixty-four games later, he’s up to a whopping 13 PIMs (he had two in Saturday’s game).

The Red Wings’ next game isn’t until Wednesday night against the LA Kings.Who knows what kind of play we’ll see then.

Christina Roberts
NHLHS Detroit Red Wings Correspondent
Twitter: @franzenmuth
Email: christina.roberts@nhlhotstove.com

Everyone knows Steve Yzerman. And if you don’t, I’m not sure I can talk to you. But all of that aside, you would have to be pretty oblivious not to see the media circus around Thursday evening’s game when the Detroit Red Wings visited the Tampa Bay Lightning for the first time since Stevie Y left to become the Lightning’s general manager.

This game was a measuring stick for the Lightning to see how far they’ve come this season. But it was also a measuring stick for the Red Wings, too, to see how well they could compete against their old, long-time captain. I know Kris Draper made a comment about how it would be different, knowing they were going up against a team with Steve Yzerman backing them.

Imagine being in Yzerman’s shoes. Imagine having to leave a place you called home for decades, only to face them again. Imagine having to root against the team that was your family for so long. Imagine having to see how they’ve changed and altered without you. Imagine seeing your old team mates down on the ice below, still playing, still racking up points, still the same as they ever were.

Think about it: there are a lot of Red Wings players on this team that Yzerman played with up until his final season in 2005-2006. He played with Pavel Datsyuk (since 2001-2002), Henrik Zetterberg, (since 2002-2003), Johan Franzen (2005-2006. Yzerman gave him the nickname The Mule), Dan Cleary (2005-2006), and Niklas Kronwall (sporadically from 2003-2004). You could theoretically count Valtteri Filppula, Jiri Hudler, and Jimmy Howard, since they did play four games apiece in the 2005-2006 season, but Yzerman may not have been in the lineup.

And then you have the staple players he played alongside. You know, the guys that make the Red Wings “old.” Chris Osgood, although not in the lineup currently, was there 1993-1994 until 2000-2001, and then again from 2005-2006 until the present day. There’s also Kris Draper, who was with Yzerman from the 1993-1994 season onward.

And then you have Nicklas Lidstrom and Tomas Holmstrom. Yzerman played with these guys for forever and both of them are still going strong.

Is it hard to see your old team mates, your long time team mates, your friends still out on the ice? Is it annoying to be compared to them even when you’re not still playing and now filling in a completely different role? And if your old coach Scotty Bowman just happens to be at the game as well, does that add the pressure? Oh, and the NHL Commissioner is there, too.

If it was anyone other than Steve Yzerman, their head might just explode.

But you have to remember that this is Steve Yzerman. He’s a leader, a role-model, any other positive thing you want to attribute to him. He stays calm in these kinds of intense-pressure situations.

The Red Wings won the game 6-2, but don’t use the measuring stick just by the score. Yes, the Red Wings dominated for the majority of the game (and yes, a fan threw an octopus onto the ice and yes, over half of the stadium was Red Wings fans), but there was a large chunk of time in the second period when the Lightning came back from a 2-0 deficit to tie the game, giving the Red Wings a glimpse of just how dangerous this Florida team can be.

It’s always nice to see Steve Yzerman again, no matter what he’s doing or where he is. …Unless it’s someplace like jail. Or Gary Bettman’s house. It’s good to see Yzerman making a new name for himself and doing so quite successfully. Cheers, Stevie, and maybe we’ll see you in the Stanley Cup Finals.

Christina Roberts
NHLHS Detroit Red Wings Correspondent
Twitter: @franzenmuth
Email: christina.roberts@nhlhotstove.com

They don’t say “Feed the Mule” for no reason. Johan Franzen comes up big at those opportune moments.

In Wednesday night’s game against the ever-struggling Ottawa Senators, the Detroit Red Wings couldn’t hold a lead for more than a minute. It was annoying, to say the least. Franzen’s first two goals came just forty-eight seconds apart to give the Red Wings their first minute-long lead of the game.

Kris Draper scored halfway through the second period, with a snipe of a goal coming from Niklas Kronwall thirteen seconds later. It led to the Senators pulling Robin Lehner and bringing in Brian Elliott. This lead lasted for almost thirty seconds.

Franzen’s first career regular-season hat trick came thirty seconds into the third. (Keep in mind that he has three postseason hat tricks.) This lead lasted twenty-nine seconds. Finally, he netted the game-winner and his fourth of the night. Henrik Zetterberg passed off the puck to let Franzen have the empty net goal and cement the victory for the Red Wings.

The last time an NHL player had five goals in a game was Marian Gaborik with the Minnesota Wild back in 2007. The last time it happened for the Red Wings was in 1996 by Sergei Fedorov.

With his five goals, The Mule now leads the team with twenty-six goals and is on pace for a career-high forty-two goals. And as an interesting little tidbit (and one to remember for your fantasy team in the future): since the 2007-2008 season, Franzen has 22 game-winning goals. That’s not half-bad.

The game against Ottawa also marked the comeback of Dan Cleary, who has been out since December 26 after suffering a fractured ankle. As hockey fans, we know not to expect too much of a player in their first game back after a lengthy injury.

He had one fantastic opportunity for a goal. The puck was on his stick and all he had to do was lift it over a sprawling Elliott. But somehow the puck launched up into the netting and out of play. It was easy to see the disappointment on Cleary’s face afterward. He only needs 4 more goals to tie his career-high twenty in a season.

Both Pavel Datsyuk and Tomas Holmstrom are slated to come back in either Saturday or Monday’s games. Brad Stuart is still sidelined for at least two more weeks while Chris Osgood and Mike Modano are out until early or mid March.

Last season after the Olympic break, the Red Wings were on fire, jettisoning them into the playoffs. While they many not have to push as hard as last year, the question still remains the same: Will they be that red-hot again?

Christina Roberts
NHLHS Detroit Red Wings Correspondent
Email: christina.roberts@nhlhotstove.com
Twitter: @franzenmuth

The injuries are stacking up yet again for the Detroit Red Wings. With the amount of key players sidelined, how the Red Wings are faring is kind of surprising.

Last year was a fluke year for the Red Wings, or so many of us fans believed.

Last year the league saw a team corrupted with injuries, a veteran goaltender struggling worse than ever and getting bested by a rookie, and the team’s players that were left seemed to falter (save for the shootout heroics of Todd Bertuzzi). Nicklas Lidstrom looked legitimately human, and Pavel Datsyuk had the worst offensive season since 2003-2004.

But as soon as the majority of the players returned, the Red Wings were back on top of their game.

This season started out with the Red Wings being absolutely dominant. Injuries didn’t seem to be cropping up like last year – that is, not as early as last year. But one by one, men wearing the winged wheel started going down.

At this point last year, the Red Wings were playing without Johan Franzen, Jason Williams, Henrik Zetterberg, Dan Cleary, Niklas Kronwall, and Valtteri Filppula (though Filppula came back from his broken wrist right around now); basically, the entire second power play unit was injured.

But that was last year. I’d like to say that this year is completely different, but that would be a lie.

The first player to go down was Mike Modano, who had a blade cut through his wrist on a completely innocent play. The result was severed tendons, surgery, rubber bands sewed through his fingernails to keep his hand immobile, a cast for six to eight weeks, and physical therapy, though he’s not to that point just yet. Modano will be out until March (and that’s putting it optimistically).

Next came Pavel Datsyuk, who fell awkwardly to the ice after tripping over Mikael Samuelsson on December 22. He has a fracture in his wrist and will be out about a month.

Then came Dan Cleary, the man who was leading the Red Wings with sixteen goals at the time of his injury. He took a shot by Brad Stuart in the ankle and is expected to be out at least a month.

And last Friday, Stuart took a targeted hit to the head by Calgary’s Tom Kostopoulos. The result is a broken jaw and six to eight weeks out of the lineup. On Sunday, Kostopoulos had a hearing and it was announced that he has been suspended for six games. While the hit was not blindside, Kostopoulos seemed to be targeting Stuart’s head. The league’s trying to crack down on head shots, so I for one am glad some sort of punishment was handed out.

In the words of Mickey Redmond, you be the judge. Dirty hit? Not a dirty hit?

Lump Chris Osgood into this injury mess, too, since it was just announced that he has to have sports hernia surgery, the same surgery that caused Kris Draper to miss the first few months of the season. He’s out six to eight weeks. Joey MacDonald will be the backup goalie during those weeks.

Now Filppula is out until probably next weekend with a strained groin. He’s only temporarily out, but on a team with so many players already missing, losing someone like Filppula even for a few games is a terrible loss.

But despite all of these injuries, the Red Wings are still winning. They don’t look as in sync as they did at the start of the season when everyone seemed to be shaking in their skates watching them soar past opponents, but they’re still second in the west, one point behind the Vancouver Canucks, and nine points up on the second-place team in their division, the Nashville Predators. They’ve won their last six road games, too.

But the Red Wings have always been known for their depth. Since Cleary went down, several players have stepped up: Patrick Eaves, Darren Helm, and Jiri Hudler have all had tremendous output, even though Eaves was out for several games due to an elbow injury. And Zetterberg has been having a fantastic season with 47 points in 42 games, tied for sixth overall in the league.

Jan Mursak and Tomas Tatar have been called up from Grand Rapids to fill in some of the gaps and after looking shaky in their first NHL games, they seem to have settled in and found their groove. And Jakub Kindl will be called up as well to fill in for Stuart.

The important questions on every Red Wings’ fan’s lips is: Can we keep winning like this with so many key players out and our healthy players starting to get tired? Who comes back from injury first? How long will it take for them to get back into the groove of things?

Christina Roberts
NHLHS Detroit Red Wings Correspondent
Twitter: @franzenmuth
Email: christina.roberts@nhlhotstove.com

Sunday’s late-afternoon game was packed full of high hopes and expectations.

It felt as though everything was at stake for the Detroit Red Wings in this game against the Dallas Stars. With such disheartening game play in Friday night’s game against the Chicago Blackhawks and seeing somewhat average in their past four or five games, Red Wings fans expected more.

That’s not even factoring in the whole sold-out home crowd waiting for what was supposed to have happened two years ago for Chris Osgood: hitting win #400 to be among some of the elite goalies in NHL history to accomplish that feat.

A two-goal lead thanks to Pavel Datsyuk and Patrick Eaves lasted only until the end of the first. Johan Franzen regained the lead for the Red Wings in the last minute of the second period.

Dallas put the pressure on in the third. The last ten minutes was end-to-end hockey, the kind of hockey that’s entertaining to watch. Osgood had to make some tremendous saves and looked to be on top of his game, ready to attain this milestone and take off some of the media pressure that’s been building.

But Brenden Morrow scored with 3:14 left in the third to tie it up at three. A bad turnover by Brian Rafalski resulted in the tying goal.

Chris Osgood

With a full two-minute four-on-three power play in overtime, the Stars had their chances and they were some fantastic ones, too. But Osgood came up big. In the end, however, it was fruitless.

Too many Red Wings were caught down low in the Stars’ zone on a pretty decent scoring chance, and three Stars rushed up ice against Niklas Kronwall, the lone Wing back. Loui Eriksson’s shot made it past Osgood to win it for the Stars.

The loss is disappointing for Red Wings fans. The Stars didn’t give up, even being down by two goals in the first. They deserved the two points they got.

But the bottom line is that even if Osgood wasn’t going for #400 on Sunday, if it was just a random game with no big milestones at stake, the varying responses would still be the same: Half of the Red Wings fans would be throwing Osgood under the bus for “giving up two goals,” and the other half would be screaming right back about the pinching defense and the tipped shots and how it wasn’t Osgood’s fault.

Hey, remember three years ago when everyone loved Chris Osgood? He was our knight in shining armor for eighteen games of the playoffs. Or even two years ago, when he hit that magic switch in the playoffs yet again and helped the Red Wings all the way to the Stanley Cup Finals in back-to-back years. He is definitely one of the most loved [and hated] players on the Red Wings team.

That debate will always be there, whether he’s a Hall of Fame goaltender or not. Even Ken Daniels and Mickey Redmond discussed it during the third period of the game. It will never disappear. But that is one discussion that I will leave up to the voters for the HHOF and wait to see what happens rather than constantly debate about it and get into fistfights. Leave it to the people who actually have a say in what happens.

Maybe we should ignore the milestone so that we don’t have our expectations so high. But let’s not kid ourselves here: We’re talking about Hockeytown, those fans that expect perfection in every game.

Speaking of milestones and demanding perfection, in Wednesday’s game last week against the St. Louis Blues, Nicklas Lidstrom managed his first career hat trick at the ripe young age of forty. And with “Operation Curly Fries” having won, Red Wings fans printed out their box scores and devoured their free order of curly fries.

Thanks for the proof that you’re still on your game, even when you’re “up there” in years, Lidstrom. And here’s hoping Osgood can jump this hurdle by the end of December so the people hating on him can stop complaining about him not hitting #400 and the diehard Osgood fans can stop waiting for it to happen.

Christina Roberts
NHLHS Detroit Red Wings Correspondent
Twitter: @franzenmuth
Email: christina.roberts@nhlhotstove.com