Red Wings 2, Coyotes 3 (0-1): Post Game Snipes...

• The Wings looked pretty good at the start of the game.
• Homer’s goal from close to the blue line was wonderful. It just kind of floated into the net past Bryzgalov’s glove. In his intermission interview (which totally validated For Sure…), even he didn’t know how it went in.
• I was kind of amused by the fact that the Wings’ first powerplay came off of a goalie interference penalty against Phoenix, when those memos the NHL sends out every year usually target Homer. Irony. It’s delicious.
• Mickey Redmond dropped a “for sure” when talking about Homer’s goal. I loved it.
• Lidstrom’s goal was one of those perfect seeing-eye shots that couldn’t be replicated if he tried it a million times.
• I never had a problem with Shane Doan before this season. Maybe I just never paid enough attention to him (It’s that whole, “Oh yeah, they have a team in Phoenix,” mentality, I guess.), but I never realized how dirty he was. He’s going to hurt someone before this series is over.
• The game-winner for Phoenix came after some textbook interference was ignored right after the faceoff. Guess who it was? Shane Doan.
• What happened to the penalty kill? Seriously, of all the times to fall apart.
• The non-call on the high stick that Lidstrom took was atrocious. And people wonder why Wings fans are conspiracy theorists. A four-minute powerplay there could’ve changed the game.
• This game was miserable to watch. The second and third periods felt like they dragged on forever.
• The Wings’ big names need to act like it.
• I hope the Wings come out angry on Friday.
  

GP Review:
16. Every single playoff round for as long as I can remember, my nightmare has been seeing the Wings come up against a hot goalie. This seems like it happens over and over and over again to them, and Ilya Bryzgalov is definitely the kind of guy who can cause me to lose sleep.
Bryzgalov was not the issue tonight. He hardly had to work for the last 40 minutes. And Homer’s goal was way soft.

15. The Wings are starting their playoff series on the road for the first time in forever. I’m still a little confused. Still, it’s intriguing.
Their whiteout was actually pretty impressive. In this day and age, though, it’s kind of stupid with the road team wearing white.

14. Will there be more octopi than snakes thrown on the ice?
Twitter told me that there was an octopus before the game, but I don’t have any visual confirmation of that. There was, however, one confirmed snake sighting.

13. Jimmy Howard’s making his playoff debut. I think he’ll be just fine.
He should’ve had the third goal, but looked good other than that. He made a bunch of nice saves, and was far from the problem.

12. What tin-foil-hat-inducing moment will we bear witness to?
It’s probably best if I don’t even get started on this one.

11. The FSD crew will be in rare form tonight, I’m sure. I can only imagine what beautiful turns of phrase they’re going to grace our ears with. I’m still mad I missed Murph’s mock awards on Sunday.
Ken Daniels referred to Datsyuk as “The Datsyukian One” during the third period. Is that new?

10. What percentage of the crowd will be cheering for the Wings? I’m willing to bet that half of the crowd noise the broadcast feed picks up will be LGRW chants.
The Coyotes fans were actually louder than I expected. I figured there would be more Wings fans in attendance.

9. I hope the game doesn’t go to a shootout. Oh. Wait. You mean ties are decided by real hockey in the playoffs? Wowzer.
Honestly, I would’ve been okay with a shootout, if only because there aren’t many opportunities for dirty hits during the skills competition.

8. This probably goes without saying, but it’s crucial to start out strong and stomp on the Coyotes’ little Cinderella story right out of the gate. Set the tone right off the bat and don’t let them get even a spoonful of confidence.
I thought this was what the Wings were doing at the stat of the game, but then they went to sleep.

7. Sixty minute game? Oh pretty, pretty please.
No.

6. How much support is the defense going to give Jimmy? As much as I’d love to see him stand on his head, my life expectancy will be a lot higher if he doesn’t have to save the day.
Not nearly enough. This loss wasn’t on him.

5. Two words: Playoff Zetterberg. Oh my goodness, do I ever love watching that man drive opposing star forwards batty.
Sadly, Playoff Zetterberg did not seem to make an appearance tonight. It’s wakey-wakey time, Z.

4. In a similar vein: Playoff Helm. Yeah.
Early on, he was in hit everything mode, but kind of faded as the game went on. Of course, he blended right in with the rest of the team.

3. One huge difference between last year’s playoff roster and this one is Andreas Lilja. I never expected to be that relieved to see him in the lineup. Wouldn’t it be ironic if he turned out to have been the missing link?
Well he certainly didn’t have any effect on the penalty kill. I thought that was supposed to be his thing.

2. I hope you’re not expecting rational thoughts or actions from me for the next little while. Word to the wise: It’s best if you don’t speak to me on gamedays. It’s also advisable to avoid me for a 24-hour period after any Wings’ loss. Trust me, you’re better off.
I really should’ve warned my roommates that the playoffs were starting. Yelling, screaming, jumping on my bed. It all happened. I’m also going to be running on 4 hours of sleep tomorrow thanks to my wonderful life decisions to stay up and watch hockey/blog about it.

1. No fear. No excuses. No mercy. No limits.
The Wings certainly looked intimidated by the Coyotes’ rough play. They were probably more concerned about making it through the game intact than anything else.

Hero: Tomas Holmstrom
He scored one of the most uncharacteristic goals of his career, and then gave a fantastic intermission interview. I really do love that guy.

Villain: Shane Doan
You know why.

Final Thought:
I’m all for Abdelkader being in the lineup instead of Williams (Who?) on Friday.

Coyotes Series Preview...

I, quite inexplicably, wrote the Game One GP before writing the series preview for the first round, so this is going to be pretty short.

Like I’ve said a couple of times already, the key to this series is going to be Ilya Bryzgalov. The Coyotes are going to live and die by his performance. I’m not kidding when I say that red hot opposition goalies give me nightmares. Bryzgalov (nickname: Breezy. What?) has the potential to spoil all of the Wings’ fun. If they can score on him as consistently as we all know they can, there’s no reason they can’t win this series. However, if he totally stands on his head, we might have to deal with and agonizing few games here.

The Coyotes fans are all up in arms about the prevalence of Wings fans in their home arena. This makes me laugh way more than it probably should.

The Wings are actually healthy for a change. They're hungry too. That's a dangerous combination, sunshines.

Guy to Grudgingly Respect: Ilya Bryzgalov
This probably would’ve been Shane Doan until the whole knee-on-knee incident. He’s a force to be reckoned with, and you have to appreciate what he’s done this season.

Guy to Fear: Ilya Bryzgalov
Yeah, he’s listed twice. Get over it. Nightmares. I have nightmares. For real.

Guy I’m Probably Going to Laugh at a Lot: Robert Lang
Just because.

Game time is in one hour. We've been waiting a long time for this. Let's get going.

Red Wings vs. Coyotes Game One GP...

Look, a shiny new GP format just for the playoffs. The idea is that for every win the Wings pick up, I get to knock one pre-game point off of my list. Obviously this is just a playoff special (Can you imagine me trying to come up with 82 things to say about the first game of the regular season?), and, uh, I’ve got high hopes that it’ll get easier as the Wings move forward. That’s perfect for me because my stress level rises exponentially with each passing playoff game. I'm going to try to keep some sort of GP Answers section in my recaps, but since they're not all questions anymore...I'm just winging it. (See what I did there?)

Sixteen things to look out for:

16. Every single playoff round for as long as I can remember, my nightmare has been seeing the Wings come up against a hot goalie. This seems like it happens over and over and over again to them, and Ilya Bryzgalov is definitely the kind of guy who can cause me to lose sleep.
15. The Wings are starting their playoff series on the road for the first time in forever. I’m still a little confused. Still, it’s intriguing.
14. Will there be more octopi than snakes thrown on the ice?
13. Jimmy Howard’s making his playoff debut. I think he’ll be just fine.
12. What tin-foil-hat-inducing moment will we bear witness to?
11. The FSD crew will be in rare form tonight, I’m sure. I can only imagine what beautiful turns of phrase they’re going to grace our ears with. I’m still mad I missed Murph’s mock awards on Sunday.
10. What percentage of the crowd will be cheering for the Wings? I’m willing to bet that half of the crowd noise the broadcast feed picks up will be LGRW chants.
9. I hope the game doesn’t go to a shootout. Oh. Wait. You mean ties are decided by real hockey in the playoffs? Wowzer.
8. This probably goes without saying, but it’s crucial to start out strong and stomp on the Coyotes’ little Cinderella story right out of the gate. Set the tone right off the bat and don’t let them get even a spoonful of confidence.
7. Sixty minute game? Oh pretty, pretty please.
6. How much support is the defense going to give Jimmy? As much as I’d love to see him stand on his head, my life expectancy will be a lot higher if he doesn’t have to save the day.
5. Two words: Playoff Zetterberg. Oh my goodness, do I ever love watching that man drive opposing star forwards batty.
4. In a similar vein: Playoff Helm. Yeah.
3. One huge difference between last year’s playoff roster and this one is Andreas Lilja. I never expected to be that relieved to see him in the lineup. Wouldn’t it be ironic if he turned out to have been the missing link?
2. I hope you’re not expecting rational thoughts or actions from me for the next little while. Word to the wise: It’s best if you don’t speak to me on gamedays. It’s also advisable to avoid me for a 24-hour period after any Wings’ loss. Trust me, you’re better off.
1. No fear. No excuses. No mercy. No limits.

There are no 7-11s in Ann Arbor. This is going to cause a serious problem when it comes time to obtain my ceremonial playoff Slurpee on gamedays. I'm used to being only half of a mile away so I could even run out during intermissions. I hope Speedway slurpees are going to cut it.

Red Wings 3, Blackhawks 2 (OT): Post Game Snipes...

• I missed most of the first two periods yesterday. This has become a disturbing trend over the last couple of weeks, but I assure you that it’s coming to an end now that the playoffs are starting. My little brother felt that it was his manly right to control the remote, and we ended up watching more Tigers than Red Wings (not that I was necessarily pitching a fit about this the whole time). No more though. It’s playoff time. Now things get serious.
• I particularly liked Brad Stuart’s shift at the end of regulation when he just kept knocking the same Hawk down again and again and again. Then he went and followed that up by scoring the game-winner in OT. You can probably guess who’s getting the baked goods at this point.
• Homer’s goal was another classic by him. In other news, if you haven’t seen it yet, Homer has a new fake blog, For Sure… (UPDATE: 4/13/10 11:58 PM: Uh, link fail.), which is being ghostwritten by several different people, including yours truly.
• It warmed my heart that the Wings were the reason the Blackhawks didn’t get to finish first in the West. A Hawks fan on twitter informed me that it was actually because San Jose likes losing games in overtime, but that makes little sense. I’m not surprised.
• The other day I said something about the Wings being done with the shootout for the season. As regulation ticked down and overtime went along, I was becoming more and more convinced that the boys were heading to a shootout just to spite me. Luckily, Brad Stuart was there to save the day.
  

GP Answers:
1. Are the Wings going to play like they want that 5th seed, or just coast through this game?
They got the 5th seed. Honestly, I don’t really care what they did to get there. It’s irrelevant now.

2. Can this game be at least a little more interesting than the last one against Columbus?
Tough call. I didn’t see most of it, but I was definitely entertained by the third period and overtime.

3. What glaring weakness is Chicago’s goaltending going to demonstrate?
Actually, from what I saw, he didn’t look too bad.

4. Can the boys just pretty please finish out this nightmarish season with a win over Little Brother?
:)

Cookies and Cupcakes for Brad Stuart
Oh my goodness, did ever look happy when he scored that overtime goal. I think part of it was relief that he didn’t miss the net, but I was happy to see him get the goal. He’s a guy that’s been solid for most of the year, but doesn’t get nearly enough credit.

Nobody gets the Golden Facepalm
Why? I’m feeling charitable today since I get to look forward to the playoffs now. Let’s head to the post-season with nothing but goodwill and rounds of Kumbaya.

What I Learned:
Bring on the Coyotes.

Lockout Hockey Photos...

I was digging though some of my old pictures, and I came across some from a charity game that some of the Wings played at Yost Arena during the lockout. I honestly can’t remember what they were raising money for, but a bunch of NHLers faced off against the USA 18-under team. In desperate need of a hockey fix, my friend and I headed down to the rink to see (among others) Steve Yzerman, Nick Lidstrom, Kris Draper, Chris Chelios, Manny Legace, Steve Duchesne, and Derian Hatcher. I’m also about 80% sure that Kid Rock coached the NHL team. It was interesting looking back through the pictures because I spotted a young Phil Kessel on the ice for Team USA. I can’t find a roster for ’04-’05, but I would suspect that if someone located one so we could compare numbers, we’d see some other familiar names. Unfortunately, my camera back then was less than stellar, so the pictures aren’t great quality.

My friend and I had total crushes on the USA goalie. That explains the numerous pictures of him as I tried to get a shot of his face. I wonder what ever happened to him…

Another good part of the game was when the PA announcer mocked Cheli for something (I can’t remember what). He proceeded to lurk menacingly around the penalty box. The PA guy then said, “Why is Chris Chelios by the penalty box?” which was a lot funnier then than it is now that I’ve typed it out.

Anyway, we had a lot of fun at the game (which I think USA won), and I love coming across hidden treasures like this.

I also finally got around to uploading my pictures from the game against Edmonton on March 30th. I’ve got shots from warm-ups, some from the alumni suite, a couple of stalkerish pictures of Sara’s family and my brother taken from the balcony, and some shots of Larry Murphy on the concourse. Click and enjoy.

Red Wings vs. Blackhawks GP...

This is the last GP I’m going to be writing. I realized a couple of weeks ago that I hated writing them and that it was stupid to keep doing so since the whole point of this is to have fun. I’ve got an idea about something to do for the playoffs, and then I’ve got all summer to figure out something new for next season.

1. Are the Wings going to play like they want that 5th seed, or just coast through this game?
2. Can this game be at least a little more interesting than the last one against Columbus?
3. What glaring weakness is Chicago’s goaltending going to demonstrate?
4. Can the boys just pretty please finish out this nightmarish season with a win over Little Brother?

In other news, make sure you check out For Sure…, Tomas Holmstrom’s imaginary blog in which he chronicles his life on the road, describes his love of candy, and ponders why nobody understands him. It’s modeled after Andreas Lilja’s blog, which is guaranteed to improve your life by at least 10% when you read it.

Red Wings 1, Blue Jackets 0 (SO): Post Game Snipes...

• If I had to choose one word to describe this game, it would be boring. I almost dozed off on the couch. If it weren’t for the oh so interesting conversations on Twitter, I probably would’ve.
• Mickey Redmond apparently has a new telestrator that he has difficulty working. It’s a shame that the season’s coming to an end and he and Ken Daniels will soon get replaced by announcers that we hate.
• Ken and Mickey also took the opportunity to fuel the Alex Burrows hate by reading his anti-Detroit comments. They even made a referee joke. It was kind of awesome.
• Helm got a penalty shot on a pretty chintzy call. He fell victim to a Mason poke check and never really got a shot off. I can’t say that I was particularly surprised
• Columbus’ crowd was so enthusiastic that the Wings fans in attendance had a LGRW chant going for a solid minute in the third period without the slightest opposition.
• With any luck, that was the last time we’ll have to see a shootout this season. Of course, by typing that, I’ve doomed us to one final one tomorrow. Figures.
• Babcock went with Kronner over some of the regular shooters. Sadly, he didn’t manage to win the game this time around.
• Another shutout for Jimmy. The Calder dream is alive and well.
  

GP Answers:
1. Hitting 100 points is still a possibility. Can the Wings take another step closer to hitting that landmark?
Ten seasons in a row, sunshines. This feels good just to keep the streak alive. Now, just for a moment, close your eyes and imagine how many more points they would’ve had if they had been healthy for most of the season or even just converted on half of those OT/SO losses…

2. What ridiculous thing is Pavel Datsyuk going to do to amaze us all today?
Score a shootout goal? It wasn’t one of his ridiculous ones, but it was pretty nonetheless.

3. Is Uncle Mike going to cut ice time to get some of the guys rested up for the playoffs?
Nope. They played this one like just another regular season game. It’ll be interesting to see how things shake out tomorrow in Chicago.

4. The efforts during the last three games weren’t exactly something to write home about. Will we get treated to a full 60-minute game?
Ehhhhhhh…Columbus never took over the game at any point, but man was that boring to watch.

Cookies and Cupcakes for Jimmy Howard
Another shootout/shutout win for everyone’s favorite Calder contender.

Brian Rafalski gets the Golden Facepalm
He did something to cause me to tweet, “Oh Rafalski, that was ugly,” and even though I honestly have no idea what it was, I’m assuming that it was deserving of this. I’m thinking that it was an ugly turnover that led to a scoring chance for the BJs, but it could be anything. I think this last paragraph shows my level of commitment to quality writing and analysis.

What I Learned:
You know it’s a boring game when you find yourself discussing National League baseball via Twitter in the middle of it.

Red Wings vs. Blue Jackets GP...

Yeah I've gotten that lazy. This is almost exactly what I posted for the last game with one minor change in the wording. Blame the NHL schedulers for making the Wings play the BJs over and over again so close together.

1. Hitting 100 points is still a possibility. Can the Wings take another step closer to hitting that landmark?
2. What ridiculous thing is Pavel Datsyuk going to do to amaze us all today?
3. Is Uncle Mike going to cut ice time to get some of the guys rested up for the playoffs?
4. The efforts during the last three games weren’t exactly something to write home about. Will we get treated to a full 60-minute game?

Hollis Stole My Title and I'm Not Thinking of a New One...

This is just a heads-up that the Wings are running a contest in which fans can submit short videos announcing that they are Hockeytown. These short clips (10 seconds or less) are going to be compiled for use in the playoff opening video. You can find the contest rules and technical specs here. There's no word on whether it will be accompanied by the ever awesome Ecstasy of Gold.

Contest of Insanity Results...

Good news, sushines. I’ve finally gotten around to sitting down with my mom so she could judge the Contest of Insanity. She selected this entry, by Rob from Etched in Cold:


I’m told that her selection was based on the fact that it was the only one that made her laugh. Those subtitles are killer. Rob’s the lucky recipient of an autographed picture of Joey Kocur and the opportunity to pose a question for me to devote an entry to, in addition to all the fame and glory that accompany being the first ever SSDD contest winner.

This one, from international superstar Herm, was her second favorite entry:


For the record, she said that this one would’ve won if it hadn’t had the “The” out front. And people wonder why I turned out to be such a perfectionist…

Anyway, I loved all of the entries and I had a good time trying to explain some of the inside jokes to my mom. These were two of my favorites, both by Jenn:



These two get the special (and recently invented) Blogger's Choice Award, so Jenn can also submit a topic for me to write about. This has been a lot of fun, and hopefully if I decide to run contests in the future, it won't take me six years to get around to judging them. Please do check out all of the contest entries in the comments section of the original post. The routine of Ctrl-C, T, V, and Enter will be your friend.