DetroitRedWings.com’s Ethan Sears presents a Sunday notebook in which he discusses Red Wings forward Filip Zadina’s desire to grab and hold onto an offensive foothold in the NHL:
“Ultimately as a player, the best players find ways to create space and some guys do it being super fast and some guys do it being big,” [Red Wings coach Jeff] Blashill said. “He’s gotta use his brain for sure. He’s gotta give and go, he’s gotta find the open areas at a critical moment where he can get a puck back.
“I think learning to get the puck out quicker and learning to be accurate with the shot is important. I think when you’re younger, you work on shooting it as hard as you can. But that’s not really the point. The point is to find those little openings not to miss the net and to score. So again, I think he worked hard at it.”
With Jakub Vrana missing the first few days of training camp, Zadina has been skating on a line with Dylan Larkin and Tyler Bertuzzi, an opportunity he hopes carries into the preseason.
“I’m doing the best I can to stick with them as well. It depends how I play hockey with them,” Zadina said. “We might be playing together at the start of the season. It’s still too far ahead to tell if I’ll be playing with them.”
Like the team as a whole, Zadina’s outlook for the season is simple: improve as much as possible.
“Just hold onto the puck, play with the puck, go more to the net,” Zadina said. “Just force myself a little bit more to shoot the puck and just believe.”
