The Detroit Red Wings saw their season high four game winning streak snapped against their arch-nemesis, the Tampa Bay Lightning on Sunday at Little Caesars Arena. After the 5-2 contest was officially in the books, the Red Wings’ record stood at 17-17-7 (41 pts).
Not terrible, but not exactly instilling confidence in fans who were expecting a new playoff streak to begin after their 25 year run was broken last year.
With 41 points in 41 games, an 82-point pace won’t be good enough to get back into the postseason. But as it currently stands, the Red Wings are six points behind the Pittsburgh Penguins (their next opponent) for the final wild-card berth in the Eastern Conference. They’ve already beaten them once this season (4-1 on New Years Eve), and will be hoping for a similar result again to inch closer.
Forward Justin Abdelkader, who scored Detroit’s second goal on Sunday, admitted the setback was frustrating, but that it was the overall picture that matters most when looking ahead.
http://gty.im/899324320
“You look at the overall picture, we’ve had a really good stretch,” he said after the loss to the Lightning. “This will leave a little bitter taste in your mouth for sure, but look at the big picture: We have a nice break coming up, everyone is going to get refreshed. We come back and really have to go at it until the All Star break. We’re getting ourselves back into the thick of things – we still have some work to do, but we have to continue to play the way we have for most of this home stand.”
Forward Gus Nyquist, who has scored 10 more goals this year after 41 games than last year, also pointed to the optimism that the collection of veterans and younger players in the Red Wings dressing room have.
“We are optimistic in here,” said Nyquist. “We all think we are a better team this point than we were last year although the lineup looks very similar. We’ve made strides as a team. If we keep playing the way we’ve been doing here lately, I think we’ll have a good chance.”
Head coach Jeff Blashill believes that his team is trending in the right direction and can beat anyone in the league when their full effort is on display. Of course, it’s one thing to do something in theory, and another to do so in practice.
“In large part we are doing a lot of things it takes to be successful,” Jeff Blashill said. “I think that; I’m told that by people around the league. We just have to stay on it and we have to understand that we are going to be in lots of games and we have to find ways to win them. We need points, but we have to keep doing it right. We have to play as complete as we can.”
“I think we can play with anybody at ant time,” he continued. “We have to make sure we don’t give up easy goals and we have to make sure we make other teams earn it. But I know we can play with anybody at any time. We can beat anybody in the league. I know that 100 percent. We have to keep going.”
The Red Wings get back in the swing of things on Saturday at Pittsburgh at 1:00 EST.
Yeah, the Red Wings are preparing for a playoff push……….in the year 2022.
Comments are closed.