Thoughts on Red Wings Lines
1. ZDH line: Best. NHL. Line. Zetterberg and Datsyuk in particular are brilliant when they have the puck. Detroit’s first goal last night came when Datsyuk won the draw in the B’s end and Z quickly lifted a shot past Tim Thomas. The goal was scored so quickly play didn’t actually stop right away. That’s how quick the game is played at times - faster than the blink of an eye.
Datsyuk benefitted from all the attention Zetterberg received to score Detroit’s second goal. There were literally three Bruins collapsing on Z as he crossed the blue line. His quick shot was stopped but there was a juicy rebound to Thomas’ right. Datsyuk moved in all alone and lifted the puck over a sprawled out Thomas to pot the game winner.
The line also plays with Detroit’s top defensive pairing of Nicklas Lidstrom and Brian Rafalski, and the d-men make a much larger contribution when the Wings are playing with the man advantage. That happened last night as Rafalski quickly potted a goal on a slapshot shortly after Zdeno Chara was sent off for hooking Datsyuk when Pavs got behind everyone and was about to go in on Thomas all alone. Holmstrom was in front of the net screening Thomas. A clearly perturbed Thomas gave Homer a little chop with his goalie stick. The goal was Rafalski’s 10th of the season, which is a career high for the d-man. It seemed pretty obvious he’d put up career numbers in Detroit after playing in a defensive system his entire NHL career in New Jersey.
If Detroit is going to win the Stanely Cup the top line is going to have to continue to dominate. Part of the reason why is the second line still is a scoring line in name only.
2. Cleary-Franzen-Samuelsson: I generally like this line from the standpoint of playing two-way hockey. You can easily matchup Franzen against Ryan Getzlaf or Joe Thornton and he’d be able to hold his own. And that will probably be a solid line come playoff time. But there’s not much offense there and it’s likely due to the fact Franzen has always been a defense-first pivot.
At the beginning of the year Franzen played alongside Pavel Datsyuk but after an early injury that plan was scrapped. He’s currently on pace to pile up 21 points. He has three goals and 2 assists since the start of the new year. The Mule has two decent scorers on his wings as Dan Cleary is on pace to pot 25 goals and Mikael Samuelsson has always been a 20 goal scorer in Detroit when he’s played close to a full season.
Cleary hasn’t tallied a point since a January 19th game against San Jose and Sammy is on pace to score 12 goals while playing 78 games. So this line just hasn’t been a scoring threat lately. If Ken Holland can work a trade to add a top 6 winger this is where that player would likely have an impact. But with Franzen not demonstrating much playmaking ability it remains to be seen how much impact that scoring winger would have.
3. The kid line: I like the makeup of this line. Valtteri Filppula and Jiri Hudler seem to have some chemistry and Tomas Kopecky is decent on the forecheck and can battle in the corners. He could also have a Tomas Holmstrom-like presence in front of the net. Fil’s having a bit of a breakout year as he’s on pace to score 23 goals and go +29, although he’s cooled off a bit lately with only 2 goals and 3 assists since the new year.
Hudler is on pace to moderately increase his productivity, but this can’t be seen as being positive at all. Last season he received scraps as he played 8.29 minutes at even-strength per game. This year he’s up to 10.38 of 5-on-5 play but he’s only pacing to score two more even-strength goals this season. The area where he really needs to make an impact is on the power play. Last year he played 120 minutes with the man advantage and tallied 3 power play goals. This season to date he’s already played over 200 minutes with the man advantage but has only scored 2 power play goals.
4. The Grumpy old men line: Kirk Maltby and Kris Draper have recently signed contract extensions and they will continue to be a fixture on the grind line and on the PK. They are both consummate professionals and do their jobs well. Kris Draper still ranks as one of the better penalty-killers in the league. Maltby did struggle over the past two seasons in the “new NHL” going -9 each year. The arrival of Dallas Drake seems to have helped Maltby find his way so that’s something positive I can say about Drake.
As far as Dallas goes, he played on the third line early in the season and didn’t fit in at all. It looks like he’s found his spot on the fourth line and he gets a night off when Mike Babcock thinks it makes sense to insert Aaron Downey into the lineup. Downey is the rare middleweight enforcer for Detroit who has actually been competent in that role. So I think there’s a good chance he’s earned that 13th forward spot.
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