Red Wave Turns Tide
The Detroit Red Wings might have decisively turned the tide in their playoff series against the San Jose Sharks. The top line of Henrik Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk and Tomas Holmstrom scored three goals and registered five assists to lead the Wings past the Sharks 4-1. The win gave Detroit a 3 games to 2 lead in the best of seven series.
It was a costly win, with Mathieu Schneider lost in the first period to a forearm injury. The injury further depletes a defensive corps that was missing Nik Kronwall and Brett Lebda. It remains to be seen how long Schneider will be sidelined but the fact he didn’t return is not a good sign. Andreas Lilja was paired with Kyle Quincey, while Chris Chelios and Danny Markov rotated being paired with Nick Lidstrom. Lidstrom was on the ice for just over 29 minutes.
Detroit has been effective in shutting down the San Jose Sharks for long stretches of time. This afternoon was no different as the Sharks didn’t score over the final 55:07 of play after Marcel Goc staked San Jose to a 1-0 lead. Tomas Holmstrom continued to make his mark on the series. The first goal for Detroit came when his putback attempt squirted to the side of the net, where Henrik Zetterberg was able to lift the puck past San Jose netminder Evgeni Nabakov at the 3:10 mark of the second period. Homer would close out the scoring in this game when he buried a shot off a nice pass from Henrik Zetterberg from behind the net.
Evgeni Nabakov has given up rebounds all series, but today was likely his shakiest game yet. He fumbled to clear a puck from his zone as Pavel Datsyuk bore down on him. Datsyuk was able to knock the clearing attempt behind Nabby and tucked the puck into the open net for the easiest score of the series thus far. That goal, which came at the 16:13 mark of the second period, gave Detroit a 2-1 lead. Nabakov had two other similar plays which resulted in very good scoring chances for the Red Wings although they would not capitalize on those chances.
Mikael Samuelsson scored the other goal for Detroit off a nice pass from Hank from behind the net that Samuelsson blasted home from the faceoff circle to Nabakov’s left. Kyle Calder only had 7:31 of ice time and Todd Bertuzzi only had a little under 11 minutes of ice time. The Red Wings rode Chris Chelios (25:40), Danny Markov (26:31), Pavel Datsyuk (20:31), Hank Zetterberg (19:44), Kris Draper (18:05) and Dan Cleary (16:04) and it was effective in holding the Sharks to their lowest number of goals scored in this series.
If Mathieu Schneider can’t go in Game 6, Derek Meech or Jonathan Ericsson would be his likely replacement. Both players were recalled from Grand Rapids and are available to fill the roster spot. Meech is a smaller defenseman but makes very good decisions with the puck. Ericsson is bigger [6′5″] and has a little more offensive upside, but isn’t quite as polished as Meech. Hopefully Schneider will be good to go, but if not it will be interesting to see which rearguard gets the nod.
The big concern heading into this series from Detroit’s perspective was Specialty Teams. After five games the Specialty Teams have unquestionably been a positive in the Red Wings’ favor. They have scored 5 power play goals (22.7%), 1 short handed goal, and have held the Sharks to 2 power play goals in 23 power play opportunities for an 8.7% success rate. The Wings have completely shut down the San Jose power play over the past 2 games and have allowed 1 power play goal since Game 2 for a 95.5% kill ratio over that time span. That is simply outstanding.
So the Red Wings head back to San Jose in an ideal situation other than the fact they are likely short another d-man. They have turned the tide with a dominating 4-1 victory this afternoon; they have completely turned what appeared to be a weakness in the Specialty Teams matchup into a decisive advantage; and they have been effective playing a solid, physical game against a larger opponent. As a result they will have a chance to end another series on the road in Game 6.
UPDATE - It’s official: Bruce MacLeod reports that Mathieu Schneider is out for the remainder of the playoffs with a broken wrist. Tough break as that is going to increase the ice time for Nick Lidstrom, Chris Chelios and Danny Markov. The good news is Brett Lebda practiced on Friday, so as Bruce points out he’s one step closer to returning to the lineup.
UPDATE: Bruce MacLeod is reporting that Red Wings general manager Ken Holland said that Brett Lebda will play in Game 6.
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Great site. Sucks about Matty Schneider, but this game was a pleasure to watch otherwise. Time for the kids to step it up.
Go Wings!
Mudshark,
Thanks for the comment and for stopping by. It really looked like the Wings took over this series yesterday. We’ll have to wait and see if that was the case on Monday night but I like what I’ve seen since Homer returned to the lineup.