Detroit Hockey Now’s Kevin Allen argues that the Red Wings will have to perform like a team with a top-10 defense to succeed this upcoming season, and the Red Wings’ players don’t disagree with Allen’s assessment:
To understand how important GAA is in the NHL, know that the top 10 teams in that category all qualified for the playoffs last season. The Edmonton Oilers ranked 10th at 236 goals goals against. That’s 2.88 goals per game. ( The Red Wings gave up 219 goals the last time they made playoffs in 2016. But that ranked them in the middle of the pack).
That means that the Red Wings probably need to give up 40 fewer goals — roughly a half of a goal per game — to have confidence in their ability about earning a postseason berth.
“I just like the two way approach a little bit, be a little more conscious,” Lalonde said. “Appreciated the goals last year. We’ll need those goals again this year. You need goals to be successful in this league. But again, I just think an emphasis, we want to keep pushing this forward. We need to do a better job, obviously finishing the bottom half of the league with goals against is not a recipe for success.”
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“That’s obviously been a focus (since Day 1)of camp — the defensive side and some key adjustments, minor adjustments,” captain Dylan Larkin said. “But I think they’re going to be really key.”
It’s the small things that matter. Coaches always preach that, but it’s particularly true when you are trying to improve defensively.
“We can be better boxing out in front of our net and make quicker stops and exit quicker so then we can play more offense,” Larkin said. “I think that’s what all the best teams, best defensive teams in the league, the hard nights, they’re big, strong defensemen in the corner that cross check and make it hard on the forwards and I think we’re trying to adopt that and trying to build that into our game throughout camp is something I’m really excited for.”
Continued; as Larkin suggests, it’s the little things that stack up.
