In the ECHL, the Toledo Walleye received goals from Tyler Barnes, Dylan Sadowy and Patrick McCarron and 23 stops on 24 shots from Pat Nagle as the Walleye defeated the Atlanta Gladiators 3-1.
The win was the Walleye’s 9th straight victory, as the Walleye’s website’s recap notes:
Continue reading Prospect round-up: Walleye win 9th straight; Fulcher wins 28th game; Rasmussen 1+1
The Detroit Red Wings hope to snap a 3-game losing streak as they host the Carolina Hurricanes this evening (7:00 PM EST on FSD/FS Carolinas/97.1 FM).
It is assumed that the Wings will have Mike Green back in the lineup as the Wings open a set of back-to-back games, with the Wings heading to New York to play the Rangers on Sunday.
Our friends from Carolina are going to be in a bit of a foul mood, and fresh off a Friday night loss: the 27-24-and-1 Hurricanes find themselves in an 0-3-and-1 stretch, with their latest loss coming in the form of a 6-1 defeat at the hands of the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Carolina is still very much in the hunt for a Wild Card spot (though they are highly unlikely to make a trade deadline addition) so they’re going to be highly motivated.
On Friday night, absent Jordan Staal (due to family issues), the Hurricanes lost big time to the Penguins, as noted by the Raleigh News & Observer’s Chip Alexander:
Jared Coreau spoke with the Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan regarding his call-up and the disappointment he overcame after being demoted to Grand Rapids at the start of the season:
“At the start of the year, I’ll admit it, I was a little down not making the team,” said Coreau, who was promoted to the NHL earlier in the week when Petr Mrazek was traded to Philadelphia. “It’s natural. I’m a competitor and felt like I had lost, you could say.
“But you have to suck it up and come ready to play. You work for it all summer, you work countless hours, days, weeks and months, and sometimes it just doesn’t work out. But you have to keep working and at the end of the day, no one is going to be mad at you for not succeeding but they might be bad at you for not succeeding and then giving up. I would be mad at myself.”
Coreau spent part of last season with the Red Wings (5-4-3, 3.46 GAA, .887 SVS) when Jimmy Howard injured his knee, but starred in the spring when he helped lead Grand Rapids to the Calder Cup championship.
Coreau felt he’d done enough to land an NHL job, but with Howard and Mrazek both on the Red Wings’ roster, there wasn’t any room for a third goalie. Coreau cleared waivers, and found himself back with the Griffins, where he and the team didn’t get off to rousing starts.“I was one game below .500, 7-8-2, at one point so I said to myself, ‘You have to get it going’,” said Coreau, 25, who has been part of the Red Wings’ organization since 2013. “If the opportunity does come, I want the Red Wings to believe in me that I do have the ability to play at this level, so I have to prove it in the AHL. That brought more intensity in the game and it paid off.”Coreau was 20-10-4, with a 2.47 goals-against average and .916 save percentage in Grand Rapids this season.
Updated 3x at 4:51 PM: The Detroit Red Wings welcomed Mike Green back to practice on Friday, but the team skated without Tomas Tatar and Justin Abdelkader (maintenance) ahead of back-to-back games against Carolina and the New York Rangers.
After practice, both coach Jeff Blashill and goaltender Jared Coreau spoke to the media regarding the team’s main priority–winning games, as Blashill told DetroitRedWings.com, and Coreau told MLive’s Ansar Khan:
Updated at 2:10 PM: Okay, I was at the doctor’s office, so I missed the majority of today’s Red Wings practice. Let’s see what happened:
Per MLive’s Ansar Khan…
Mike Green back at practice after taking a couple days off due to injury. #RedWings pic.twitter.com/TW7CqaNvm5
— Ansar Khan (@AnsarKhanMLive) February 23, 2018
The Free Press’s Helene St. James…
Mike Green practicing with Red Wings. Has missed 4 games with sore neck.
— Helene St. James (@HeleneStJames) February 23, 2018
And DetroitRedWings.com’s Dana Wakiji:
I have a doctor’s appointment at 12:45 PM, so I won’t be able to cover all of practice. MLive’s Ansar Khan reports good news regarding Mike Green:
Mike Green back at practice after taking a couple days off due to injury. #RedWingspic.twitter.com/TW7CqaNvm5
— Ansar Khan (@AnsarKhanMLive) February 23, 2018
The Free Press’s Helene St. James confirmed…
Mike Green practicing with Red Wings. Has missed 4 games with sore neck.
— Helene St. James (@HeleneStJames) February 23, 2018
As did DetroitRedWings.com’s Dana Wakiji:
Continue reading Doctor day Tweets from practice: Green skating with the team
From the Detroit Red Wings:
Red Wings Fan Day at Little Caesars Arena set for March 19
Free, fun-filled event presented in partnership with Coca-Cola and Kroger
DETROIT – The Detroit Red Wings have teamed up with Coca-Cola and Kroger to present Fan Day at Little Caesars Arena, scheduled to take place on Monday, March 19 from 5:00 – 9:00 p.m. ET.
Several members of the Red Wings Alumni Association will be on hand to sign autographs for fans in attendance for the event. Hockey fans can also bring their ice skates to skate on the ice at Little Caesars Arena, as well as enjoy multiple interactive hockey zones, a wide variety of prizes and promotions for fans of all ages, and numerous photo opportunities.
Continue reading Red Wings to hold “Fan Day at LCA” on March 19th
Updated at 10:46 AM: MLive’s Ansar Khan penned a 7 AM-posted article regarding the Red Wings’ 3-2 OT loss to Buffalo last night. Khan addresses the Wings’ anger with the “good goal” call on Evander Kane’s marker despite Jason Pominville’s presence in Jimmy Howard’s crease:
“I thought hockey ops had done an unreal job the first part of the year of making a gray rule as black and white as they could,” Blashill said. “Basically, if you went in the blue on your own and you made contact with the goaltender and kept him from being able to play his position, it was going to be called back.
“Then there was a meeting at the All-Star Game and there was a feeling too many goals were getting called back, so they want to go back to this term ‘egregious.’ What’s egregious mean? It means something different to (everyone), so now we’re back to ultra-gray.
“All I know is Pominville had no reason to go into the crease. He stood literally right in front … right on the goalie. … So, I don’t know what goalie interference is now.”
Neither does Howard, who said Pominville’s stick prevented him from getting his own stick out to cover the post.
“That’s a pretty big part of the equipment there, especially on the wraparound,” Howard said. “You lead with your stick and hoping to cut that off and that was taken away.”
Khan continues, duly noting that the Wings have a horrible 12-13-and-8 record at home…
And Fox Sports Detroit posted its post-game videos in slightly belated fashion, posting comments from Henrik Zetterberg…
The Detroit Red Wings lost a 3-2 OT decision to the Buffalo Sabres on Thursday night, with the Wings dropping to 0-2-and-1 over their last 3 thanks to a Marco Scandella goal with 0.3 left in overtime.
This was a particularly frustrating loss for the Wings, who fired 70 shots at or near Robin Lehner, but found 23 attempts blocked by a tremendous shot-blocking Sabres defense.
Evander Kane’s 2-1 goal was of particular consternation to the Wings, because Jason Pominville skated into Jimmy Howard’s crease of his own accord and checked Howard’s stick, preventing the Wings’ goaltender from poke-checking away Kane’s wraparound…
Continue reading Red Wings-Sabres wrap-up: buzzer-beater plus disputed goal equals frustrated Wings
The Athletic’s Craig Custance answers questions about Henrik Zetterberg’s future, the Red Wings moving “bad” contracts and possible trade deadline scenarios in his latest mailbag, but the most pertinent question he answers regards one Mike Green’s trade value:
What reasonable package can we expect for Mike Green from Tampa? Would Cal Foote be in play?— Greg Jennings
The defenseman market has changed a bit on the Red Wings in reference to any possible deal with the Lightning. It wasn’t all that long ago that Mike Green was the best defenseman you could pick up at the deadline. Things have changed pretty dramatically on that front.
First, came McDonagh and the Rangers’ entry into the sellers’ market. Now, it’s clear that Erik Karlsson is very much in play, even if that’s a deal that might be easier to pull off in the summer. Both of those defensemen are expected targets of the Lightning and you have to imagine GM Steve Yzerman would exhaust efforts to get those two first before turning to Green as a backup plan.
Cal Foote is much more likely to be a part of a package for McDonagh or Karlsson than he would be for Green. The Lightning are a team that needs to make every cap dollar work, so a young defenseman who is one year closer to playing in the NHL than what they’ll get with their first-rounder this year is more valuable to the Lightning than a 2018 draft pick. So, I think that’s a big ask in a Green deal. Where it might make sense is if the deal expands out to include Green along with one of the Red Wings’ wingers and Foote was a player the Red Wings liked in the draft. But again, that would have to mean the Lightning didn’t have success elsewhere in the trade market.
Continued (paywall, and worth your time), and I believe that the best the Wings will get for Green is 2 2nd-round picks.
As Custance suggests, with Erik Karlsson the queen of the deadline brigade on defense and Ryan McDonagh the bridesmaid, Green just isn’t going to go for as much Wings fans would like. No Cal Foote + a 1st…
And part of the reason I say that involves the Tampa Bay Times’ Joe Smith’s latest talk with Steve Yzerman:
General manager Steve Yzerman said Thursday he’s not sure what, if anything, he’ll be able to accomplish by the deadline, saying there’s “very limited” amount of fits so far in terms of what they want to do. And the fact Yzerman said he doesn’t plan to deal from his current roster – including young core players like Brayden Point and Mikhail Sergachev – makes it unlikely Tampa Bay will have the king’s ransom Ottawa would demand for its franchise player.
“At the trade deadline, when you’re trying to acquire players, usually teams that are selling are looking for younger players, draft picks and prospects,” Yzerman told the Tampa Bay Times today. “At this stage, the young players on our team, we want to keep on our team and we want to add to that. We’re trying to keep this team together with the hope of improving it.”
There’s no guarantee the Senators will even move Karlsson by Monday, as it they could just wait for this summer’s NHL Draft, where there might be more teams in the bidding. But the Lightning is among the teams that have, not surprisingly, kicked the tires on Karlsson.
The Lightning has other options as it hopes to address its blueline. There’s Rangers captain Ryan McDonagh, 28, a shutdown defenseman who has another year on his contract at $4.7 million. McDonagh has a 10-team no-trade list, but the Lightning isn’t on it. They could be a match if the price is right.
Tampa Bay could also target pending unrestricted free agent Mike Green (Detroit). Columbus left-shot Jack Johnson, a pending UFA, seemed like a good fit, but The Athletic reported Thursday the Blue Jackets have began engaging in contract extension talks with the veteran defenseman.
The Lightning has all of its draft picks the next three seasons, and a deep prospect pool including Cal Foote, Taylor Raddsyh, Brett Howden, among others. But Yzerman isn’t going to give up the farm – whether it’s for Karlsson or anyone else – noting there’s no guarantee a Stanley Cup will be the reward.
Keep in mind that if Tampa Bay acquired Karlsson, it’d probably be for just 1 1/2 years, as he’ll likely demand between $10-12 million annually as a free agent in the summer of 2019.
“I really don’t want to just get a player or something at all costs,” Yzerman said. “I don’t believe in that. Obviously if we feel we can improve our team and it gives us a better chance to be more successful in the playoffs, that would be our goal. I may not be able to do that.”
