Notes and interviews from Friday’s morning skate at the Red Wings’ prospect tournament ’19: Zadina, Lindstrom, Seider and coach Simon

Of brief note from the Red Wings’ morning skate ahead of tonight’s game vs. Chicago (7 PM on Fox Sports GO):

1. Taro Hirose, Joe Veleno and Filip Zadina will be the top line for coach Ben Simon’s team. Not a bad group to start with.
2. Kaden Fulcher will start tonight as Filip Larsson is nursing a minor injury. Larsson took part in practice sans going into the butterfly; Fulcher got the reps in the starter’s net.
3. Moritz Seider actually feels that he’s in a little-to-no pressure situation as he prepares for his first competitive games on North American ice. He’s challenging himself to be the best person and player he can be.
4. Today’s practice consisted of morning skate-style drills–puck retrieval, breakouts and PP-PK drills. Coach Simon said that the players focused more on systems during Thursday’s practice, in which they also did fitness testing.

Here are the interviews that the morning skate afforded me:

Filip Zadina spoke to myself and the Traverse City Record-Eagle’s Jake Atnip regarding his summertime training in Detroit, his up-and-down season in Grand Rapids, what he’s attempting to accomplish over the course of the prospect tournament and training camp and whether there’s a sense of redemption available should the Wings win this one:

Gustav Lindstrom spoke with me briefly, discussing the adjustments he will have to make to the North American-sized ice and North American pace–and Lindstrom hasn’t played on an 85-foot-wide rink since the World Junior Championship–what he’s looking to accomplish, and what he might be able to add as someone who won a SHL championship last spring:

Moritz Seider surprisingly suggested that he’s playing in a pressure-free environment; instead, he believes that the Red Wings will see a good player and good person do his best to learn over the course of the next two weeks, and he’ll go from there:

Coach Ben Simon confirmed that Kaden Fulcher would start tonight, and that the Hirose-Veleno-Zadina line will indeed be unveiled this evening; he discussed the expectations he believes the prospects face over the course of a short tournament, how one assesses their progress, and what the team was doing this morning in engaging in simpler drills to refresh the team after a long day on Thursday:

Also, from the Wings:

Who’s tuning in tonight?!@filip_zadina #DRWPT | #LGRW pic.twitter.com/qp1os2YtJ7— Detroit Red Wings (@DetroitRedWings) September 6, 2019