Cup of Khan: Wings ‘leaving points on the table’

MLive’s Ansar Khan addressed the Red Wings’ status as “leaving points on the table” in a Monday morning column:

Even with 24 games remaining, the playoffs are a longshot for the Detroit Red Wings. It is difficult to erase a seven-point deficit this late in the season and it’s even tougher to leapfrog four teams in between.

But the Red Wings could have been in the thick of the race by doing a better job closing games. Sunday’s 3-2 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs at Little Caesars Arena was the latest squandered opportunity. Auston Matthews scored with 30.2 seconds remaining in regulation to snap a tie.

They lost 3-2 at Florida on Feb. 2 when Jonathan Huberdeau scored with 7.7 seconds to play in the third period. They blew a three-goal lead with less than six minutes left in the third and lost 7-6 in overtime to the New York Islanders on Feb. 9.

That’s five potential five frittered away in those three games.

“I thought we did a good job in Nashville (3-1 victory Saturday). I thought we did a good job against Anaheim (2-1 win last Tuesday), but we’re leaving points out there in those tie games.”

Blashill, whose team fell to 24-25-9, said it’s a matter of players growing.

“Understanding that they got to dig deep in those little situations,” he said. “The Florida game was different, they were really leaning on us for two straight shifts. (Sunday) was not that case. I thought we had some good chances in the last 10 (minutes) of the third.”

Khan continues…

Cotsonika: Holland isn’t clearing the decks

NHL.com’s Nicholas J. Cotsonika spoke with Red Wings GM Ken Holland regarding his team’s trade deadline outlook, and Holland insisted that his team will not “clear the decks” in search of a total rebuild:

“Am I open to making deals that I think are going to be better for us long term? Yeah,” general manager Ken Holland said before a 3-2 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs at Little Caesars Arena on Sunday. “But it’s got to make sense. We’re not a farm team.”

The Red Wings probably will miss the Stanley Cup Playoffs for the second straight year after making them for 25 straight seasons. They are 24-25-9. With 57 points, they’re seven behind the New York Islanders and Carolina Hurricanes in the race for the second wild card into the playoffs from the Eastern Conference.

Holland has not changed his philosophy. He does not want to tear down the roster to rebuild. He wants to win as much as possible while rebuilding on the fly through drafting and developing.

Clearing out contracts?

“Great to move somebody out,” Holland said. “At the end of the day, if you don’t have somebody to move in, you’ve got to go out and find somebody to move back in.”

Giving roster spots to young players?

“They’ve got to be ready,” Holland said.

Continued

TSN’s Dreger talks Flyers and Mrazek

From TSN:

TSN Hockey Insider Darren Dreger reports the Philadelphia Flyers are having ongoing discussions with the Detroit Red Wings regarding goaltender Petr Mrazek.

The Flyers, already without starter Brian Elliott, lost fill-in starter Michal Neuvirth to a lower-body injury in Sunday’s win over the New York Rangers.

Rookie Alex Lyon stopped 25 of 26 shots in relief as the Flyers improved to 30-19-10 on the season.

Update @ 2:33 PM: TSN also posted this:

Glendening has drawn interest from the Toronto Maple Leafs, as reported on Friday. Coach Mike Babcock said recently “the people that need to know, know” when asked about his trade wishes.

Well, now we know one of them. Glendening, 28, broke into the NHL under Babcock in 2014-15. The idea would be for Glendening to replace oft-scratched centre Dominic Moore on the fourth line.

The belief is the Maple Leafs offered a fifth-round pick for Glendening, while the Red Wings countered by asking for a second-round pick. Talks were tabled at that point, with the Leafs unwilling to pay that price. Glendening has three years left on his deal at $1.8 million and the Red Wings are amid a rebuild.

 

Red Wings-Maple Leafs wrap-up: Leafs’ thievery yields another frustrating loss for Wings

The Detroit Red Wings dropped a 3-2 decision to the Toronto Maple Leafs in the final seconds of Sunday night’s game, surrendering a goal to Auston Matthews’ with only 31 seconds remaining in regulation.

It was a disappointing defeat for a Wings team that played a tremendous game against Nashville on Saturday, but could not maintain its work ethic and resolve over the course of 120 minutes of play.

Our friends from Toronto were quite happy to leave Little Caesars Arena with two points, as they told the Toronto Sun’s Terry Koshan:

Continue reading Red Wings-Maple Leafs wrap-up: Leafs’ thievery yields another frustrating loss for Wings

On Chris Chelios’s latest Olympic adventure

The Los Angeles Times’ Mark Ziegler penned a superb article about Red Wings ambassador Chris Chelios, who is currently serving as an assistant coach for the U.S. Olympic men’s hockey team:

Chelios retired in 2010 after 26 seasons and 1,651 games in the NHL, the most by a defenseman. He worked in the Detroit Red Wings front office for a while, as a Fox TV analyst and as an assistant coach for Team USA at international youth tournaments.

But mostly he hung out at his beachfront home in Malibu, went snowboarding in Utah, traveled around to watch his daughters play lacrosse at Northwestern and his son play minor league hockey with the Charlotte Checkers.

He was in Malibu in August, sitting on the deck, gazing out at the Pacific, when his cell phone buzzed. It was Jim Johannson, the general manager of USA Hockey and a former teammate at Wisconsin. Did he want to go to a fifth Olympics?

“From out of nowhere,” Chelios said. “It wasn’t like Jimmy Johannson had mentioned it to me or asked me if I’d be interested. I just got a call. Right away, yes. Really honored and thankful that these guys picked me.”

The obvious next step for Chelios, 56, is to become an NHL head coach, but he has never been an obvious sort of guy.

Continued

Prospect round-up: Walleye lose to Mallards; Smith scores a goal for Kitchener

In the ECHL, the Toledo Walleye rallied from a 2-0 deficit against the Quad City Mallards on goals from Austen Brassard and A.J. Jenks…But the Mallards rallied with a 2-goal 3rd period, building a 4-2 deficit that the Walleye couldn’t quite squeeze, ultimately losing 4-3.

Erik Bradford had a goal and 2 assists for Toledo, and Matej Machovsky stopped 25 of 29 shots. The Walleye’s website posted a recap:

Continue reading Prospect round-up: Walleye lose to Mallards; Smith scores a goal for Kitchener

Red Wings-Maple Leafs quick take: burned late, out-hustled, out-worked, out-Matthews

The Detroit Red Wings attempted to defeat a difficult opponent in the Toronto Maple Leafs on Sunday.

Detroit plain old got out-worked, out-hustled and out-scored in a 3-2 defeat in which the Maple Leafs’ Auston Matthews scored the gamer with only 31 seconds remaining in regulation time. The Wings took a 1-0 lead and rallied from a 2-1 deficit in the 3rd period, but the Wings tried to nurse a 2-2 tie to overtime, and they were out-worked and out-detailed by a tremendously talented team.

This was a weird game in many respects, and when Dylan Larkin is -3 and his linemates, Andreas Athanasiou and Tomas Tatar are -2, that’s not the greatest sign.

Mrazek was good but not great, the Wings’ decision to play 7 defense (Ouellet skated in a rare game) instead of going with Witkowski seemed to backfire, and this was just another one of those nights against an opponent that the Wings seemed to be unwilling to out-work.

And Leaf fans went wild:

 

Continue reading Red Wings-Maple Leafs quick take: burned late, out-hustled, out-worked, out-Matthews

Mrazek’s stylistic tweaks paying off

Red Wings coach Jeff Blashill spoke to the media prior to Sunday night’s game, and he praised Petr Mrazek’s stick-to-it-ive-ness in parlaying hard work tweaking his game into on-ice results, as noted by DetroitRedWings.com’s Dana Wakiji:

 

Much as Howard did, Mrazek got to work in the offseason to rebuild his game and become even better.

This season with Howard as the primary starter, Mrazek has maintained the habits he established in the offseason and it is paying dividends now.

Wings coach Jeff Blashill, a former goaltender himself, saw it in the 3-1 victory over the Nashville Predators Saturday night.

“He made a big save last night in the third on a one-timer in the slot,” Blashill said. “The first rebound got away from him but I thought the save was unreal in the sense that his feet were set, he had made a little shuffle over, his feet were set and then he just leaned into the puck, he didn’t have to reach for it because he had taken that little stutter-step with his feet. That’s a change in his game that he’s worked on over the course of the year so that’s a little goaltending thing that you wouldn’t necessarily notice but when I saw that, I was excited. It just said that he’s continuing to get better.”

Wakiji continues

Duff talks trades

Hockeybuzz’s Bob Duff discusses possible trades involving the now-usual Red Wings subjects of trade rumors–Mike Green, Luke Glendening, Jimmy Howard, Petr Mrazek, Gustav Nyquist and Xavier Ouellet:

Mike Green: Headed for unrestricted free agency, it will be a shock if the Wings don’t move Green. Washington, his previous home, has long been rumored as a destination – Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin has lobbied loudly for Green’s return to the U.S. capital – but there’s a new team on the horizon who look to be the front runners in the Green sweepstakes.

That would be the Tampa Bay Lightning. It’s interesting that Green was scratched from Saturday’s 3-1 win at Nashville with what was reported as an upper-body injury, because according to NHL sources, Wings general manager Ken Holland and Lightning GM Steve Yzerman are well along the trail in talks to work out the details to make this move happen. Detroit’s price is high. The Wings would love to land a first-round draft pick, and with the Lightning entering the playoffs as favorites to cop the Stanley Cup, that could be a price they are prepared to pay.

Although he’s stated a desire to remain in Detroit, Green would be willing to waive his no-trade clause for an opportunity to go to a Cup contender.

Duff continues…