Open Game Thread
Detroit Red Wings at Chicago Blackhawks
January 8, 2012 – 7:30 PM
TV: NBCSN
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It’s the second of back-to-back games against an Original Six opponent tonight, as the Red Wings visit the Chicago Blackhawks one night after a 4-3 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs.
The Red Wings will start backup Ty Conklin in net after Jimmy Howard got the nod in Toronto. Mike Commodore is expected to replace Jakub Kindl on the blue line, as Mike Babcock had previously said both would play this weekend.
Up front, two injured Red Wings return, as Tomas Holmstrom and Darren Helm will come back into the lineup. Gustav Nyquist was sent back to the Grand Rapids Griffins with Holmstrom’s activation off of injured reserve. Chris Conner remains with Detroit but is expected to be a healthy scratch tonight.
Game time is 7:30 PM and NBC Sports Network has the TV.
Hell of a pass by Zetterberg on the Fil PPG.
Wings are buzzing.
Second period was stronger. Looking forward to the third.
Conklin huge on the penalty shot.
What a bunch of bs the reffing is tonight….I’d love to hear Mickey’s take on this….
Holy Christ, I can’t believe that wasn’t blown dead. Great job to keep fighting around the net.
Conklin has played well, I think. The Wings have looked like their timing is just a little off…whenever they don’t connect on so many passes, they aren’t at their best.
Wasn’t a pretty win, but it still counts!
I’ve got to say, I was surprised by a lot of things in the Red Wings’ win over the Blackhawks tonight.
Ty Conklin’s performance was the biggest surprise for me. He’s had a relatively awful season and after giving up two goals in the first 4:19, it looked like more of the same was coming. He really pulled it together, though, finishing the night with 29 saves on 31 shots and stopping Jimmy Hayes on a penalty shot. His second-best start of the season, he earned his second win.
That penalty shot stop was just solid goaltending. Hayes didn’t make a good move but Conklin kept his head in it and stayed where he needed to be. Would have been easy for Conklin to be jumpy there and he wasn’t.
I said at the time that I can’t believe the Wings’ second goal wasn’t called back for intent to blow. Not because I think the puck was actually frozen (replay showed it trickle through Corey Crawford’s pads, and we saw the same thing happen to Jimmy Howard recently), just because of how often that goes against Detroit.
I do think the Wings got away with too many men on the ice in overtime, not going to lie about that one. I would have complained about it had it been Chicago getting away with it. They had already done it once in the game and it was lazy the second time. The cop-out is to say that the refs had pretty much put the whistles away by that point but I don’t like relying on it. Just a lucky break.
The game winning goal was a hell of a shot at a non-existent angle by Pavel Datsyuk, helped by a deflection off of Nick Leddy. Chicago wasn’t happy with the scramble in front of the net but I didn’t see contact with Crawford.
That’s two games in a row the Wings had to rally, which isn’t good. That they did rally both times is nice but it only worked once. They can’t keep digging themselves holes like that.
Nothing good can be said about that goal.
Wings appear to be trying to beat the awfulnees of their start last night.