The Red Wings aren’t the only people who’ve been riding a roller coaster this season. My health has been as unpredictable as usual, and I’m finally coming back from a month-long hiatus thanks to a flu-like illness that only antibiotics were able to knock down the bug.
So I want to thank you with all my heart for sticking around, for lurking or just stumbling back onto the site as we get ‘er back up and running. I am incredibly grateful for each and every one of you.
Long story long, the NHL’s parity parade is well underway, and while Detroit doesn’t find itself in a playoff position this American Thanksgiving, they’re within striking distance of teams with a strong record.
The Wings aren’t exactly going to catch the 18-and-5 Winnipeg Jets, but, should the Wings at least earn a couple of points over the course of Friday’s game against New Jersey and Sunday’s game against Vancouver…
Things could start looking up for the Wings in a hurry.
Now December’s schedule isn’t easy by any stretch of the imagination; the Wings will be playing every other day between tomorrow and December 9th, and they’re going to be playing 4 of 5 on the road between December 3rd and 12th.
Showdowns with Atlantic Division rivals Boston, Ottawa, Buffalo, Toronto (times two) and Montreal (times two) also loom, so, should things go south, they might go sour in a hurry.
As of November 28th, however, the Red Wings still have a tremendous opportunity to keep the good times rolling as they attempt to build upon their modest two-game winning streak when the 15-8-and-2, 4th-place-in-the-NHL Devils come to town tomorrow at 3 PM EST, and then when the 11-7-and-3 Canucks join the fray for a 12:30 PM EST matinee.
It’s not going to be easy by any stretch of the imagination for the Wings to remain on the “straight and narrow,” but the possibility is there to at least solidify a place among the Wild Card favorites by playing just a modestly good set of hockey games over the 15 games between now and the New Year.
Whether the Wings can pull it off is something I don’t really know. I wish I could pull something out of my butt and prognosticate with certainty as to what will happen going forward, but I’m a lot of things, and arrogant isn’t one of ’em.
We’re going to have to wait, hope, and see whether the Red Wings can truly steady their ship on their own, or whether the Red Wings’ GM and management team may have to make changes behind (coaching) and on the bench (player personnel) in order to shake things up and point the Wings toward the season’s halfway point (or nearly so) in good condition.
Obviously, the Wings need to keep up their stellar goaltending, strong power play performances, and rectify their even-strength scoring, their messy penalty-kill, and get veterans like Vladimir Tarasenko and Patrick Kane going, so that the team can start tapping into its secondary scoring, too.
For the present moment, it’s a middling Thanksgiving for the Red Wings, but those of us who find ourselves in the strange marriage that is a sports-partisan-and-sports-team relationship can at leas wait, hope, and see as we all ride the roller coaster that has been the 2024-2025 season.
And in the WHL, Kamloops Blazers captain Emmitt Finnie had an assist, finishing at +1 with 4 shots and a 9-for-21 faceoff record as the Blazers lost 6-2 to Spokane.
Red Wings prospects on Twitter posted Finnie’s assist:
Emmitt Finnie(7th round ‘23) 1 Assist (shorthanded) +1 4 Shots 2 PIM 9/21 FOW in a 6-2 loss. #LGRWpic.twitter.com/Nvm6bXQsQl
“I think that we’ve shown that we can play these games,” [Cam] Talbot said. “We knew that coming into this game, Calgary, they’re an aggressive team. They forecheck hard. They tend to try to just outwork their opponents and grind them down. And we bent, but we didn’t break for the most part all night. I thought if anything, we kind of took it to them for most of the game. And then we give up that late one and you can do one of two things. You can either fold and give the game back to them, or you can come out in overtime and get the game-winner. So, we did a good job mentally of not letting that one get to us and finishing the win.”
Talbot is 6-4-2 and his .921 save percentage is tied for sixth in the league among goalies with 10 or more games.
“He’s been huge for us,” [Coach Derek] Lalonde said. “He’s brought a lot to our room, too. We’ve lost some important pieces to our leadership group which a lot of teams experience just to turn over. If we play a complete game in front of him, we don’t give up easy offense, we don’t give up rushes, we don’t give up east-west stuff … it’s been pretty consistent what he’s given us.”
Lucas Raymond’s game-winning goal was almost as much relief as anything else, given that the Wings worked so very hard to earn what turned out to be a single point…
On Wednesday night, the Red Wings truly won a strange game. The Flames are full of pop-gun offense, but instead, Alex DeBrincat scored a regulation power play goal at 6:33 of the 1st, Connor Zary tied it up at 17:12 of the 3rd on a power play, and Lucas Raymond scored the OT winner at 3:35 of OT on the power play.
In between, Cam Talbot was sterling in stopping 24 of 25 shots, the Red Wings played well against the Flames’ puck possession machine, and the game seemed endlessly boring at times, but exciting at others, and it was most exciting at the right moment.
Detroit has now won 2 games and hopes to win another when the Devils come to town on Friday.
Patrick, a three-time Stanley Cup champion and 2016 Ted Lindsay Award recipient, has enjoyed watching the two boys continue to grow their love of the game.
“It’s fun to see Patrick and Archie enjoy coming to the games so much,” said the NHL veteran of over 1,200 regular-season games. “It’s such a great privilege the Red Wings allow them to be outside the locker room when we come back for warmups and give the players fist bumps. I know Patrick enjoys it so much and looks forward to every game he can come to. And the next day when I ask him what his favourite part of the game was, he always says, ‘playing hockey with my friend Archie.’”
Like sons, like fathers. The forwards played together from 2017 to 2022 in Chicago, before Alex was traded to Ottawa in July 2022.
Alex, who was selected 39th overall by Chicago in the 2016 NHL Draft, played an integral role in convincing his former teammate to sign with the Red Wings, which Patrick did last November.
“He’s fun to be around,” said DeBrincat. “He’s a funny guy who is always joking around. As a teammate, he is a good leader he brings that experience and wisdom to the team. There are a lot of different things that he excels at. He’s won almost everything you can win and from my personal experience, it’s cool to learn from him. He is always working on his game and always trying to elevate what he does.”
Of Red Wings prospect-related note in Europe today:
In the Finnish Liiga, Jesse Kiiskinen had 2 assists, finishing at +1 in 18:35 played as he returned from injury in in HPK Hameenlinna’s 4-3 overtime loss to KalPa:
Jesse Kiiskinen 2 Assists +1 9 Shots 18:35 TOI in a 4-3 OT loss
Good first game back for Jesse. Was on the ice for 3 of HPK’s goals and wasn’t on the ice for a GA. First assist was really nice. Lots of creation. Took a borderline hit that’s in the clips below but came back.#LGRWpic.twitter.com/DFkiDb2S6m
Updated at 3:21 PM: The Detroit Red Wings are aware of the fact that most teams which are in the playoff mix at American Thanksgiving make the playoffs. As such, Detroit’s players told MLive’s Ansar Khan and the Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan that they know they have to buck a traditional trend:
“I think the biggest thing about U.S. Thanksgiving – what’s the numbers? It’s like 70-80 percent make the playoffs – and usually that’s the top end of it,” [coach Derek] Lalonde said. “It’s usually that 20 percent that’s battling throughout. Hopefully, we’ll stay in that mix and that battle.”
Last season, 13 of the 16 teams in a playoff position on this holiday qualified. The Red Wings were among the three that didn’t (St. Louis and Seattle the others), and the only one in the Eastern Conference that missed.
“You look at the standings and you don’t want to be too far behind at this time of the year,” Dylan Larkin said. “I don’t think there’s much to if you’re in first place right now, you’re going to finish in first place. They’re not handing out trophies at U.S. Thanksgiving. Twenty games in and our division’s clumped up. We just need to get on a run and we’ll be back in the place we want to be.”
They’ll need to play more like they have the past three games (2-1-0, five goals against) than the three before that in California (0-2-1, 15 goals against).
“I know much of it is goaltending, but as far as the way the team’s playing, our goalies have been really good and we’re still giving up a lot of chances,” Larkin said. “Not a lot off the rush and not much in the slot. But when it has been there, our goalies have answered it. And I think that’s key to playing defense — they can’t be taking slot shots every shift, four, five, six times a period. So, we minimize them and really try and focus on keeping them to the outside. And if they want to float pucks in, we’re going to box out and make a clear lane for our goalie.”
