Update (1:22 PM): I don’t think I’m the only one, but I’m really wishing the League hadn’t catered to NBC and scheduled Game 2 on Sunday. I guess it is good that the game will get such a wide audience on Sunday and there’s no way the NHL was going to pass up on Atlanta/New York or Pittsburgh/Ottawa tomorrow, but I don’t like that gap as a fan. I just want to watch the Wings play again and the wait will seem interminable. I’m not too concerned that they’ll will lose their focus over these two days, but it doesn’t really help their momentum not to play Saturday. - Matt
Update (12:15 PM): By the way, the Wings had 37 hits to the Flames’ 36, so there wasn’t that much of a disparity. The shocking part is that the Wings were playing with such physicality at all, no matter that they didn’t really outhit Calgary by a wide margin. - Matt
For the second year in a row, the Wings opened the playoffs with a win, but unlike last year, this was a decisive win that set the tone of the series very much in the Wings’ favor. Whereas last year they were lucky to beat the Oilers in that first game in overtime, the Wings last night dictated the game to the Flames for nearly an entire 60 minutes.
It was quite the show of force for the team few people are choosing to win this series and one where they took all of Calgary’s smack talk and stuffed it back in their faces. They held Calgary to a mere 20 shots and put up 46 of their own, thus quieting the Flames’ boasts that they would pepper Dominik Hasek. Most importantly, they carried the physical game to the Flames, rather than the other way around. Everyone in the Winged Wheel from big Andreas Lilja to little Jiri Hudler was initiating contact all night.
Continuing down the line, Pavel Datsyuk threw off that monkey with a beautiful goal; Henrik Zetterberg was held without a point, but gave Kiprusoff and the Flames defense fits all night, showing that his back is indeed fine; the Wings rolled four lines and pressured with all of them, getting a goal from Valtteri Filppula; Johan Franzen stood out with a nice assist and physical play; and Dominik Hasek was equal to the task of stopping any shot the defense allowed.
Mike Babcock started Pavel Datsyuk between Henrik Zetterberg and Tomas Holmstrom, but the first minutes of the game were slow. Jarome Iginla sent a shot hight and wide in the first minute and the Flames were able to grind it out for a little while 30 seconds in. Going the other way, Dan Cleary was tripped up/hooked, but there was no call on the play. Seconds later, Mathieu Schneider opened the Wings’ night of hitting with a nice one on Matthew Lombardi. Not long after that, the officials apparently wanted to give the Wings a freebie so they called Kristian Huselius for slashing. I definitely didn’t see it on the replay, but the replay was only about 3 seconds long so it’s conceivable that I missed it and that it was deserved.
They took a little while to set up, but then they did and they got a few really good chances. Pavel Datsyuk and Tomas Holmstrom had a few swipes at it down low, but they were too badly mauled by the Flames defense to really drive the puck home. Somewhere in there, Pavel sent the puck off the crossbar from a bad angle. The puck was cleared, and Wayne Primeau and Craig Conroy carried in on a strong shorthanded chance. Conroy’s shot ended up getting stopped by Hasek on the goalline. With 13 seconds left in the power play, Mathieu Schneider unleashed one heck of a blast from the blueline. That had to hurt. KO for Calgary.
Right after the power play was over, Jiri Hudler decked Huselius at center, which was good to see. The game hit a choppy stretch, with whistles coming frequently. The Wings seemed to have a little trouble handling the puck, which was bouncing a lot all night. Maybe the ice could use some work, Mr. Sobotka. As a result, the puck spent a little more time in the Detroit end than is preferable, but it was kept along the boards and the Flames didn’t get much.
The Wings opened the scoring at 4:51. Brett Lebda carried the puck down the left wing over the blueline, dished it off to Johan Franzen, and headed to the net. Franzen waited and then centered it from the left boards to Valtteri Filppula in the slot. Kiprusoff apparently had his eyes on Lebda and was only covering the left side. Fil’s one-timer went into the open right side of the net and put the Wings up 1-0. It was his first NHL playoff goal.
They looked a little sloppy immediately after the goal, but that soon passed. The Flames were getting away often with what seemed an awful lot like interference. The Wings continued their physical play, with Dan Cleary getting in on the action and Henrik Zetterberg laying the body on Rhett Warrener.
At 6:56, Alex Tanguay took a holding penalty on Danny Markov in a play that could have gone either way. The Wings set up, but the Flames knocked it down with a high stick and then touched it, so play stopped. After the faceoff, Schneider got off a shot, but the zone was cleared. He tried again on the carry-in, but Kiprusoff made an easy stop. On their next setup, the Wings took a two goal lead on a flukey play. Robert Lang ended up with the puck along the left wing and waited overly long, it seemed to me, before dishing it to Jiri Hudler behind the goalline. Jiri sent it out front to Nick Lidstrom, who had jumped up in the slot and got off a bit of an awkward one-timer. It was going well wide, but Brad Stuart tried kicking it further out only to deflect it in past Kiprusoff. 2-0 Wings at 8:36.
Dan Cleary and Mikael Samuelsson threatened to score not long after that with a nice break into the Calgary end. At this point, everyone on the team was looking good, especially Jiri Hudler and Valtteri Filppula, both of whom did not get much ice time in the first. Around the halfway mark, the Wings were really swarming the Flames.
This was cut short by Mick McGeough’s first (really only) big screw-up of the night. The Wings were deep in the Calgary zone, with Datsyuk and Zetterberg working their magic. The Flames got the puck back behind the net only to have it immediately stolen by Tomas Holmstrom, who passed it back to Brett Lebda at the point. Lebda sidestepped a diving Flames player and was about to take a shot on a great scoring chance when McGeaugh whistled the play dead.
Apparently, Pavel Datsyuk had slashed Warrener. However, replays showed that the only thing that could have been seen as a slash was what Tomas Holmstrom did to steal the puck a good 10 seconds before the whistle went. Keep in mind that Homer assumed possession of the puck and then passed it on to Lebda, who had enough time to step around a Flame and set up a scoring opportunity. That is the time McGeaugh chose to call Pavel Datsyuk for slashing. It’d be one thing if he’d given Homer a penalty after so much time, but Pavel was totally innocent on the play. Ridiculous.
Anyway, the Wings pretty much put on a textbook penalty kill. They pressured the puck carriers, which is uncharacteristic of them, with Johan Franzen narrowly missing earning a breakaway by stealing the puck at the blueline, but fumbling it too much before he got going. Nick Lidstrom denied the Flames entry on one carry-in attempt and Andreas Lilja knocked the puck away beautifully on another. Zetterberg played Phaneuf’s shadow late in the kill, denying the Flames that big shot. In the last seconds of their power play, Calgary got some pressure going and it continued after Datsyuk stepped out of the box, but good work by Danny Markov and Lilja kept them from scoring. Pavel picked the puck up and cleared it with a high arcing backhander.
After that, it was Detroit that was standing the Flames up at the blueline, as Calgary had a lot of trouble gaining the zone. The Wings didn’t have much trouble getting in the Calgary end, however, and a nice shift by Hudler, Filppula, and Franzen (the “fourth” line) resulted in a Flames penalty at 15:14. This power play wasn’t such a good one for the Wings, who gave up a decent shorthanded chance while Mikael Samuelsson was the only Wing back. Sammy played it well and got the puck first, but Lombardi ended up falling and McGeough’s arm went up again. I didn’t see a definitive replay of it, but it seemed to me that Lombardi stumbled, not that he was tripped. In any case, the team’s skated four a side for 47 or so seconds.
Pavel Datsyuk demonstrated both his speed and his strength at one point during the 4-on-4 as he burst down the left wing and took a shot that looked like it hurt Kiprusoff, who huddled up and leaned over after the puck slammed into his stomach. Not long after that, the Wings had to kill off the Samuelsson penalty. Again, they pressured the puck carriers and it paid off. The Flames couldn’t get the shot they wanted early on and the Wings’ prowess in the faceoff circle made things even more difficult. Datsyuk showed up on the PK with a nice clear of the puck that killed off a lot of seconds. On their last set up of the power play, Calgary got off a good shot when Roman Hamrlik released one. Hasek made the stop, however, and Samuelsson’s penalty expired.
Late in the period, Datsyuk got involved in the physical play as he threw his body around with gusto. As the clock wound down toward zero, he carried the puck out of the Wings zone and over the redline, dumping it down the ice in a manner that struck me as symbolic of the Wings’ attitude in the first period: confident, disciplined, and serious in a way that meant they would do whatever they needed to do to win.
Robert Lang, Mikael Samuelsson, and Kyle Calder started the second period up front for the Wings. It wasn’t until Zetterberg, Datsyuk, and Holmstrom came over the boards, however, that the Wings got a big scoring chance. Nearly two minutes into the period, Datsyuk sprung Zetterberg and Holmstrom on a 2-on-1 just as Andrei Zyuzin blew a tire at center. Hank carried the puck in down the left wing and then dished it off to Homer for the one-timer. It should have been a goal, would have been a goal on most anyone else, but Kiprusoff made one of the top 3 or 4 saves of the night, snapping the puck up with his glove as he sprawled across the net from his right to his left. Even though I was highly disappointed, I had to say “wow!” to that.
I don’t know if the 2-on-1 energized the Wings or what, but they really kicked it up a notch after that. They swarmed the Flames, pouncing on every mis-played puck, and keeping Kiprusoff busy with shots from everywhere. Their scoring chances hit a peak at 4:04 when Pavel Datsyuk ended up with the puck in the slot with only a Flame stick between him and the goal, as Kiprusoff was essentially down and out. Pavel skated across the face of the net trying to get a clearer shot and that gave Kiprusoff time to get over and make the save, as the eventual shot was not high enough. Granted, he was defended and didn’t have the greatest shooting lane, but I was begging Datsyuk to shoot there for what seemed like the longest time.
Anyway, there was a scrum after that play which resulted in Brad Stuart and Tomas Holmstrom getting roughing penalties. With the teams skating four a side, Henrik Zetterberg and Pavel Datsyuk both had good scoring chances, with the latter again taking too long to shoot. I felt something was coming for Pavel, but then he kept blowing those chances. It was frustrating. Robert Lang had a good chance on the next shift as the Wings continued control play, and Johan Franzen laid a big hit on Zyuzin. I believe it was FSN’s Check of the Game.
Not long after the expiration of the Stuart and Holmstrom penalties, Pavel Datsyuk got behind the Calgary defense, getting a lucky bounce on a pass from Homer. He used what little space he had well as he cut across the net from left to right, looking like he was going to take the puck past Kiprusoff’s outstretched left leg and try for that shot. With Kiprusoff fully stretched out, however, he flicked it in 5-hole to score his first playoff goal since the 2002 Western Conference finals. 3-0 Wings at 6:56.
Knowing that the Flames would be upset at being down 3-0, Babcock chose to stuff it in their face a little more by putting out Franzen, Hudler, and Filppula out on the next shift, showing that the team isn’t afraid of Calgary’s frustration. They drew a penalty after creating pressure in the Flames’ end, with Wayne Primeau dealing Franzen a dumb cross-check.
The Wings were a little sloppy setting up on the ensuing power play. On one carry-in, Stuart cross-checked the heck out of Zetterberg’s back. Finally, they got set up and had a good scoring chance off a Lidstrom shot with Homer out front. Hank just missed the rebound. Their pressure continued with the expiration of the penalty and it was only seconds before they scored again. The Wings cycled the puck well and finally found a wide open Mathieu Schneider in the high slot. He took the pass, stepped up and released a shot that rang in off the crossbar before Primeau could get back in the play. 4-0 Wings at 9:57.
The Wings had another scoring chance 30 seconds later when Dan Cleary went down the right wing. Nothing came of it though. After that, the Flames regained their feet a bit and started controlling the play a little more. They had a great scoring chance around the 11:00 mark, but Hasek stoned Alex Tanguay. Dom lost sight of the puck after the save, however, and kept looking behind him like it had gone in. The Flames only got a halfhearted second shot on net, though, and the puck was smothered as Hasek got up to speed. There was a scrum after the play and both teams lost a player to the penalty box: Kris Draper for Detroit and Roman Hamrlik for Calgary.
With the teams skating four a side again, Henrik Zetterberg showed good effort as he broke in the Calgary zone by himself. He put on his usual inside-outside-inside show, but was stopped. The Flames got set up in the Detroit end and cycled a little, but couldn’t score. At the other end, Kiprusoff turned the puck over to Lidstrom, who got a shot off, but was stopped. Datsyuk followed up on the rebound, but Kiprusoff made another stop on that one.
Just after the expiration of the Draper and Hamrlik penalties, Henrik Zetterberg was called for holding. A good call, but one that Hasek misread as he started heading to the bench. He’s fortunate the Wings touched the puck and that the Flames didn’t score. It was one of Dom’s few excursions for the net last night.
On the penalty kill, the Wings did a pretty good job of holding the Flames off. Of course, having Calgary ice the puck helped. A good kill.
After that, there was a lot of up-and-down action, with neither team necessarily holding the edge. With 51 seconds left in the period, Zyuzin took a holding penalty and the Wings went back on the power play. They had some great chances but the period ended without another goal.
The Flames came very close to scoring at the start of the third period while the Wings were on the power play. In the middle of cycling the puck, Schneider hit a rut in the ice and fell, losing the puck to Stephan Yelle, who streaked up ice. Nick Lidstrom closed on him and Hasek made the save, but it was a little tense for a second there.
Back at even strength, the Flames showed that they had decided to be more physical in the third. A nice defensive play by Lilja earned a hard hit by Iginla in response. Then Iginla ran Hasek. The Wings didn’t start cowering, though, and continued generating scoring chances.
Chris Chelios got hurt early on in the period after he fell awkwardly. He was out there on the next shift, though.
The game slowed down a bit as it headed toward the midpoint of the period. The Wings kept up their physical play, seemingly going out of their way to knock Flames down and into the glass. Lilja finally started using his size like he should, knocking down Huselius around the 6:30 mark. Not only were they physical, they looked confident with the puck and were doing the whole teamwork thing to the max.
At 9:16, two of the Flames’ stars lost their heads and were slapped with roughing penalties as a result. The first involved Dion Phaneuf, who saw fit to sucker punch Zetterberg as Hank drove around the back of the net. Then Iginla, apparently not satisfied with Phaneuf’s work, came in and hit Zetterberg high, despite the fact that the Flames were already on a delayed penalty.
On the ensuing 5-on-3, the Wings had a couple decent scoring opportunities, but made good on none of them. It would have been nice to have seen them make Phaneuf and Iginla pay. Oh well.
After that, the intensity of the game went down a bit as the Wings backed off and the Flames were apparently too demoralized to do much. Iginla tried to get his troops going by yapping incessantly at the officials. At 12:03, Schneider and Primeau went off for roughing and cross-checking, respectively, and we had 4-on-4 hockey again. At 14:00, Danny Markov took a hooking penalty and the Flames got a 1:57 of power play time as a result. It took them only until 14:55 to score. Huselius, wheeling along the right wing boards, sent it down to Langkow on the goalline. He centered it to Tanguay, who one-timed it on net. At first, it looked like Dom had made the save, but it slowly trickled in between his legs. 4-1.
After their goal, the Flames started showing some life. They starting getting more physical and looked like they finally remembered they had a hockey game Thursday night. The Wings maintained a defensive posture, however, and didn’t back down.
During a commercial break later in the period, a fan proved that the Faithful still go to the Joe, despite the shameful showing of Wings fans last night that resulted in the end of the sellout streak. This fan threw an octopus on the ice and we got to see the familiar sight of Al Sobotka waiving it in the air. That was one of the few displays of spirit from that crowd last night, something I personally found disgusting. On Wednesday, the Scotiabank Place was rocking after the Sens scored one goal, but the Joe was like a tomb when the Wings were skating circles around the Flames and knocking their skulls together on top of a 4-0 score. If that place isn’t sold out and at least louder than a restaurant on Sunday, I’ll truly be ashamed.
Anyway. Enough, “Shame on you, ‘fans’” talk. The focus here is the team.
Emotions hit a peak at 18:36 when Dan Cleary drove to the net and knocked down Kiprusoff, who was outside the right post. Dan knew what was coming as a result, and he covered himself behind the net while Stuart and Warrener waded in. Maltby was the first to come to his teammate’s defense, while replays showed Kris Draper desperately trying to prevent things getting too bad. Andreas Lilja then skated up, fists flailing and after that, Danny Markov did his best Mike Hart impression and jumped the pile (earning, “First down!” and comments like that from the FSN crew). The poor linesmen got there and it was all they could do to hold off Stuart and Ritchie, both of whom were yanking Cleary around violently by his collar. Finally, it all ended and the penalties were handed out. From the boxscore:
18:36 STUART, B. : Roughing - 2 min
18:36 RITCHIE, B. : Misconduct (10 min) - 0 min
18:36 HUDLER, J. : Interference - Goalkeeper - 2 min
18:36 CLEARY, D. : Misconduct (10 min) - 0 min
18:36 CLEARY, D. : Roughing - 2 min
Honestly, I’m not really sure why Cleary got misconduct and roughing. I understand the interference call, but it seemed to me like he was the one taking the beating from Stuart and Ritchie. I saw Lilja swinging and Markov pile diving, but I didn’t see Dan do much else beyond cover his head. Perhaps I just need to see the replay again.
In any case, the Flames ended up on the power play after that. It was cut short, however, when Jarome Iginla took himself out of the game by taking a dumb cross-checking penalty at 19:16. The night ended with the teams skating 4-on-4, the Wings killing time and the Flames pretty much letting them. There was some exchanging of pleasantries afterward, but nothing too heated.
Like I wrote last night, things could hardly have gone better. The Wings looked great and started the playoffs with a well-earned win for the first time in years. It was great to see and a little shocking. I mean, I had high hopes and expectations, but their physical play surprised me a lot. I knew guys like Franzen, Cleary, Calder, Lilja, and Markov would be throwing their bodies around, but I never thought Mathieu Schneider would set the physical tone of the game at the start, that Pavel Datsyuk would go looking for hits, that Babcock would send Jiri Hudler and Valtteri Filppula out after the Wings went up 3-0 at a time when the Flames were pretty pissed. They really set the tone last night and it was awesome to see.
One of the most encouraging things about the game was that the Wings were getting the majority of the breaks. That complemented their stellar play and is one of those indicators that things are going their way. The Lidstrom goal and the play that set up Pavel’s goal, in particular, were lucky bounces and lucky bounces are what teams that are going to go far into the playoffs need. Now, it was only Game 1 and the series could still go differently. I have to say that. However, I don’t see things going south. This is a new Red Wings team and I believe they have set out to prove that they are capable of playoff success.
It was a wake-up call for the Flames, make no mistake. Calgary will not be taking the Wings for granted again. They will come out Sunday hitting hard and with an edge, much like they did later in the third period last night. Will it be enough? I don’t think so. If Bertuzzi comes back, the Wings become that much more physical themselves, and last night showed that guys like Datsyuk and Zetterberg are not going to shy away from contact. I expect Kiprusoff to be better, but I’m not worried about that. The Wings have the offensive firepower they need, and they have Dominik Hasek in to back them up.
By the way, you’ll notice I didn’t need to mention Dom much. I think that’ll change in Game 2 as the Flames get their offense more involved, but again, I have no worries. When called upon, Hasek was very steady last night. He didn’t wander much at all and he didn’t make any other glaring mental mistakes. He’s going to prove that he’s still got it, believe me.
Game 2 is huge for both teams. The Flames need to rebound with a good game and the Wings need to continue what they started. I can’t wait.
Some links
Shift chart
Play-by-play
Super Stats
Wings bloggers/media
Abel to Yzerman
Ansar Khan
Behind the Jersey
Gorilla Crouch
Quo Vadimus
Flames blogs
Flames Blog
Five Hole Fanatics
Hit the Post
The Real Deal
Red Mile
