MLive’s Ansar Khan welcomes Monday morning with an article discussing the possible impact of the Zadina-Fabbri-Ryan line on the Red Wings’ rather desperate need for reliable secondary scoring:
“They all have the offensive ability to be a top-six type line in the NHL,” coach Jeff Blashill said. “You hope they can feed off each other, you hope their offensive acumen complements each other. We needed to make sure Fabbri can play with the tenacity to get the puck, that Zadina can play with the tenacity to go get the puck. Bobby has a lot of experience and can help those guys in a lot of situations.
“I thought Bobby skated really well [Saturday], which is an important thing for him. He’s not a natural unreal skater, he’s a guy who has to work at it. I think he’s put himself in real good shape and worked real hard this summer with a skating coach. That would have been my only concern, is there enough speed on the line? Is there enough to go get pucks? I thought they did a good job with it.”
If this line can be a consistent scoring threat, the Red Wings can keep intact the top line of Dylan Larkin, Anthony Mantha and Tyler Bertuzzi.
“We just feed well off each other, from off the ice to on the ice,” Fabbri said. “That’s huge. When you connect off the ice things become much easier on the ice. As you start to learn where each other is going to be on the ice, each other’s tendencies, that’s when you build that chemistry. You play a little quicker when you know where someone’s going to be, and you know what play you’re going to make when you get it. Just a good mixture of size, speed, skill.”
