A brief Red Wings-Canadiens preview with game notes

The Detroit Red Wings host the Montreal Canadiens tonight (7 PM EDT start on FanDuel Sportsnet Detroit/TSN2/RDS/97.1 FM) and head to Montreal tomorrow to take part in an old-fashioned home-and-home series against an opponent that believes it’s on the rise.

Montreal stands at 12-16-and-3, but they’ve split their past 4 games, and they smacked the Sabres 6-1 on Tuesday thanks to a Patrik Laine hat trick.

Montreal also sits only 3 points behind Detroit in the Atlantic Division standings, so if they split the series via a victory and an OT or shootout loss, they’ll tie the 13-14-and-4 Wings’ for 5th in the Atlantic.

Field Level Media posted a Wings-Habs preview which summarizes the Habs’ state of mind as Laine surges (and the Habs acquired defenseman Alexandre Carrier from Nashville on Thursday):

The Canadiens, who are 4-3-0 in their last seven games, are coming off Tuesday’s 6-1 home victory over Buffalo behind Patrik Laine’s three power-play goals. Laine has six goals in seven games since recovering from a knee injury.

Laine was acquired from Columbus during the offseason. He appeared in just 18 games last season due to a broken clavicle and a six-month stint in the NHL/NHLPA Player Assistance Program.

“Obviously, it’s nice to have. Any time you have a threat, a weapon, especially on the power play, that just makes you a lot more deadly,” forward Josh Anderson told the Montreal Gazette. “It’s nice. Special teams are so important these days. It has won games. It obviously gave us a huge boost (Tuesday).”

With Laine and Cole Caufield (17 goals), the Canadiens have a formidable scoring duo on the power play.

“We have more weapons with Patty. It’s about finding a way to have predictability for us and unpredictability for the other team,” coach Martin St-Louis said. “They can move around, change spots sometimes, because the opponent has to respect both of them. We’re learning how to play together on the power play and how we can maximize everybody’s strengths.”

The Hockey News’s Karine Hains posted a game preview with stats and historical context…

Continue reading A brief Red Wings-Canadiens preview with game notes

Two things: On the Wings’ stead and Larionov’s potential

Of Red Wings-related note this morning:

  1. The Free Press’s Helene St. James wrote an article which discusses the state of the Wings after the team earned a “bonus day off” on Thursday:

With the Wings having just played Wednesday, beating the Philadelphia Flyers, 6-4, that adds up to four games in six days โ€” and Wednesday was especially taxing for several players.

When defenseman Simon Edvinsson left in the first period with an upper-body injury โ€” no update was available Thursday โ€” it forced the coaching staff to deploy the five defensemen who were left onto the ice more often than normal. Ben Chiarot led the workhorse brigade with 29:14 of ice time โ€” that’s just short of having played half the game, and roughly eight minutes more than Chiarot usually averages.. Moritz Seider logged around 28 minutes, about three above his average. Justin Holl and Jeff Petry also saw more shifts than usual; the only defenseman who didn’t was Erik Gustafsson, who was a minus-2 in in 15:30 of ice time.

The day off also reflects that the Wings (13-14-4) have put together some winning hockey of late, taking six points from their last four games. Now they have an opportunity to keep that going against the Canadiens, who share the Atlantic Division with Detroit and sit below them in the standings. This is the first time since around Thanksgiving that the Wings seem to be building a bit of traction, and banking more points is crucial to their attempts at climbing into the playoff picture.

Continued; we’ll find out about Edvinsson at the Wings’ morning skate;

2. Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff posted the gist of a Russian article in which Islanders GM Lou Lamoriello praises Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod coach and Red Wings alumnus Igor Larionov:

Continue reading Two things: On the Wings’ stead and Larionov’s potential

Tweet of note: Augustine, Plante made U.S. WJC team roster

Via Red Wings Prospects on Twitter, Wings prospects Trey Augustine and Max Plante both made the final cut for the United States’ World Junior Championship team roster:

They will be joined by Axel Sandin Pellikka, who will play for Sweden, and Jesse Kiiskinen, who will play for Finland, as Red Wings representatives at the 2025 World Junior Championship in Ottawa.

Update: Here’s a bit about Plante’s status from the Hockey News’s Sam Stockton:

Plante’s place on the roster was less assured, in part because of an injury that limited him to just five games in the first half of his freshman season at the University of Minnesota-Duluth.  Plante was not initially included on the roster for this week’s USA selection camp in Plymouth, MI, but then received a late invitation.

Tuesday, before Plante had officially been named to the team, USA general manager John Vanbiesbrouck said of the situation, “Max was a late add just based on his hand and wrist.  He was just too good to leave out of our group, and so we watched him the last four weeks.  When somebody’s wearing a splint, it’s kinda hard, but he’s just playing too good.  You gotta give him that shot, and he deserves to be here.”  After camp, the Americans had four cuts to make, and Plante was not among those sent home, proving that he wasn’t just too good to omit from camp but also from Team USA’s final roster.

Prospect round-up: Johansson takes 22 PIM’s, MBN returns from Norway’s WJC team

Of Red Wings prospect-related note in Europe today:

In the SHL, Noah Dower Nilsson finished at -1 with a shot on goal in 16:12 played as Frolunda HC lost 4-2 to HV71 Jonkoping;

Anton Johansson finished at -1 with 1 shot in 17:48 played–and he took TWENTY-TWO penalty minutes over the course of an end-of-game brawl during Leksands IF’s 2-1 loss to the Malmo Redhawks;

And Michael Brandsegg-Nygard has returned from Norway’s Division 1B World Junior Championship team, and he finished even with 3 shots in 15:24 played as Skelleftea AIK won 3-0 over Timra IK.

Axel Sandin Pellikka is absent from Skelleftea AIK due to preparations to play for Sweden at the 2026 World Junior Championship.

Video: Griffins go Christmas shopping for ‘Random Acts of Kindness’ and Family Promise of Michigan

Per the Grand Rapids Griffins, captain Josiah Didier and forward Brogan Rafferty took their families out for a shopping trip for Random Acts of Kindness and Family Promise of Michigan:

On scrambled defense

The Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan posted a meaty notebook article this afternoon, discussing the Red Wings’ “scrambling” defense last night, J.T. Compher breaking his 22-game goal-less slump, and sharing Ville Husso’s demotion to Grand Rapids.

Regarding Simon Edvinsson’s absence due to his upper-body injury (there was not clarification on that as the Red Wings didn’t practice today), Kulfan offers this:

With Edvinsson unavailable, Ben Chiarot filled in to play with Moritz Seider and played a season-high 29 minutes, 14 seconds. Seider, who absorbed a shot near his head late in the game but was not hurt, played a season-high 28:02.

Jeff Petry played 20 minutes, Justin Holl played 17:14 and Erik Gustafsson 15:30 as the Wings compensated for the loss of Edvinsson (played six shifts, 5:36).

Edvinsson collided high with Philadelphia’s Rasmus Ristolainen in the first period and appeared a little uneasy skating back to the bench.

“Obviously he (Edvinsson) only played a handful of minutes there,” Lalonde said. “Really good on our D-core to play most of the game with five (defensemen) and a lot of those D are not accustomed to playing top-four minutes. They gutted it out.”

Seider and Chiarot have plenty of experience playing together and the chemistry returned quickly. Chiarot ended with a plus-three for the evening, and arguably had one of his best games of the season, adding three hits and two blocks.

“Both played really well,” Lalonde said. “We had (Philadelphia) registered for three (scoring) chances in the third. We gave them 19 shots the entire game and that’s a pretty good offensive team and obviously those two are leading it playing most of the minutes. Good on them, they were winning shifts for sure.”

Continued (paywall)

Press release: Ville Husso assigned to Grand Rapids

Per the Red Wings:

RED WINGS ASSIGN VILLE HUSSO TO GRAND RAPIDS

  โ€ฆ Goaltender Has Appeared in 140 Games with St. Louis and Detroit Since 2020-21 โ€ฆ

DETROIT โ€“ The Detroit Red Wings today assigned goaltender Ville Husso to the American Hockey Leagueโ€™s Grand Rapids Griffins.

Husso, 29, has appeared in eight games with the Red Wings during the 2024-25 season, posting a 1-4-2 record with a 3.47 goals-against average and an 0.877 save percentage. The 6-foot-3, 208-pound netminder has also logged a 4-0-0 record with a 1.58 goals-against average, a 0.944 save percentage and one shutout in five appearances with the Griffins this season. Husso was limited to 19 appearances with Detroit in 2023-24, showing a 9-5-2 record with a 3.55 goals-against average and an 0.892 save percentage. He also stopped all 25 shots he faced with the Griffins on Jan. 26 against the Belleville Senators during a conditioning stint. Originally selected by the St. Louis Blues in the fourth round (94th overall) of the 2014 NHL Entry Draft, Husso has compiled a 70-44-18 record with a 3.03 goals-against average, a 0.901 save percentage and seven shutouts in 140 appearances with the Blues and Red Wings since 2020-21. Additionally, Husso has posted a 55-54-16 record with a 2.64 goals-against average, a 0.910 save percentage and 12 shutouts in 135 AHL games with the Chicago Wolves, San Antonio Rampage and Griffins, earning a place on the AHL All-Rookie Team in 2017-18. 

A native of Helsinki, Finland, Husso played three seasons with HIFK in Finland’s SM-Liiga from 2013-16 prior to arriving in North America, finishing with a 60-33-21 record and 10 shutouts in 121 appearances. In his final season with HIFK, Husso was named to the SM-Liiga All-Star Team and captured the Urpo Ylรถnen Award as the league’s top goaltender after recording the circuit’s best goals-against average (1.91) and save percentage (0.927) in 39 games during the 2015-16 campaign. On the international stage, Husso represented Finland at the 2018 IIHF World Championship, showing a 1-2-0 record with a 2.33 goals-against average in three appearances. He also competed at back-to-back IIHF World Junior Championships in 2014 and 2015, winning a gold medal at the 2014 tournament. Husso was a member of Finlandโ€™s bronze-medal entry at the 2013 IIHF World Under-18 Championship and made three appearances at the 2012 Ivan Hlinka Memorial Tournament.

Tweet of note: FloHockey profiles Trey Augustine

FloHockey’s Chris Peters profiled Team USA World Junior team goaltender and Red Wings prospect Trey Augustine today…

And you can watch the entire 2:49 video here (no embed code, sorry).

Update: Here’s the YouTube embed:

Stockton on the sticky situation that is #91

Sergei Fedorov turned 55 on December 13th. I know that because Fedorov was born on the same day and same year that my parents were married.

As the Hockey News’s Sam Stockton noted on Twitter, Fedorov’s former team, CSKA Moscow, retired the #18 that Fedorov wore during his time in Russia (via HockeyNewsHub):

But we all know that #91 is not retired in Detroit, which Chris Chelios remarked upon during last night’s TNT broadcast of the Wings’ 6-4 win over Philadelphia:

Stockton posted an article about the situation, and the situation is…complicated:

Continue reading Stockton on the sticky situation that is #91