Wings 4, Blue Jackets 1 at On the Wings

… Let me begin by saying I was embarrassed for the Blue Jackets last night. I don’t know how many times a Columbus player would just fall to the ice for no apparent reason or blow an easy pass for no apparent reason. The brief stretches that the Jackets looked interested were mostly brought on by Rick Nash and did nothing to make up for the long periods in which they looked like they were playing in an exhibition game.

… On the other side of the ice, the Wings were spectacular in moments, less so in others. The first and third were strong periods, but the second was a virtual yawn fest as the Wings sat back and easily beat back the feeble attempts at a comeback by a Columbus team not taking itself seriously enough to be dangerous for more than a minute at a time.

… The Wings’ first goal felt about 10 seconds late, as Pavel Datsyuk had Fredrik Norrena down and out but chose to pass it back to Nick Lidstrom, who had a clean shot at a virtual empty net. The goal was another example of Pavel’s maddening practice of passing the puck when he has a glorious scoring chance of his own. He frequently makes the right decision in those situations, and this was one such case. If he were a right-handed shooter, he would have had a clear shot at the net, but he isn’t so he didn’t.

… Henrik Zetterberg’s goal was just pathetically easy. A perfect pass from Datsyuk made the Jackets look like a pee-wee squad.

… The Jackets’ goal came off the stick of Rick Nash, who earned it with a performance the whole night that put his teammates to shame. In a perfect world, you’d like to see Hasek stop that shot, but Nash is a bona fide goal scorer and released a rocket.

… Franzen’s certainly got the hot stick. We can only hope it carries through to the playoffs.

… Datsyuk made the Jackets’ defense look like amateurs on his third period shorthanded goal. He stole the puck not once, but twice, en route to his 31st of the season. He was flying all night.

… For some reason it didn’t click with me before, but the Wings’ strategy with the first power play unit seems to be to have the defense carry the puck nearly to the blueline before dropping it off to Pavel Datsyuk, who streaks in after building up speed coming out of the Wings’ zone. They haven’t quite gotten the timing right yet, but it’ll be spectacular when they do.

… Hasek was solid. He didn’t have to face many shots (12), which has to drive him crazy. It was good to see him maintain his concentration, though.

… All in all, a solid win for the Wings, who are in a battle to retain their concentration as they finish the season against the Central.

… In response to the fact that the Wings have now had three consecutive 50-win seasons, Pavel Datsyuk told John Keating:

50 wins very important, more important sixteen wins.

Exactly. (via Snapshots)

… Tuesday should be an interesting game against the Blues. The Wings should see the return of Dan Cleary and Valtteri Filppula, as well as Dallas Drake, that night, and will be able to begin kicking into playoff mode for real.