Game Four Postgame Notes

Call me greedy but I still expect more from the Red Wings than we got tonight.

Jimmy Howard had his best game in awhile so he gets a pass. Howard stopped 29 shots en route to the shutout. As I said at the time, him staying with the puck and making a save in the second despite having lost his mask showed how on his game he was.

The rest of the team, however, still had some patches where they looked tentative. There were long stretches in the first and second that just felt slow.

The Coyotes definitely had some jump coming into the third period and the Wings were scrambling to hold onto their lead.

That said, special teams were fantastic. One-for-three on the power play and perfect on the PK, including 18 seconds of a Phoenix five-on-three. If the Wings had cleared the zone at even strength as well as they did during the third period PKs I probably wouldn’t be complaining right now.

An additional plus, I’m not entirely impressed with Ilya Bryzgalov. Maybe we should be worried that he hasn’t stolen a game yet, I don’t know.

Overall, still not a 60-minute effort but they definitely outplayed the Coyotes and you can never complain about a shutout.