Postgame: Sharks @ Red Wings – 2/19

Quick notes because it’s an afternoon game and I say everytime that I hate afternoon games ’cause I have things to do in the afternoon…

For those saying that getting to twenty-three consecutive home wins means that the asterisk so many people want to put on this streak should be wiped out, remember that if you say the wins needed to be in regulation, the streak ended at twelve. Personally, I think it’s better to just ignore the people arguing that this streak is invalid. As I mentioned last week, you can always find a reason to apply an asterisk when you compare records across eras.

The Sharks played the Wings tough today. To a certain extent, it was a lot like Friday’s game against Nashville in that the visitors dictated the style of play for much of the game. This was probably a bit more physical than Detroit would have liked but they stepped up to the challenge and won anyway.

Notes on some specific plays…

San Jose shouldn’t have been on the power play for their first goal. While fluky as hell, the goal itself was good. The situation that caused it never should have happened, though. Brad Winchester had the puck when Jonathan Ericsson engaged him, that’s not interference. Call it holding if you want, I’d argue that less, I just really don’t like the call.

I won’t nit-pick other calls, but you know I want to. Especially the goalie interference call on Bertuzzi.

I didn’t like the Justin Abdelkader – Ryane Clowe fight in the third. Abdelkader put a clean hit on Clowe there and there was no reason to have to fight over it. The fight only served to give the Sharks energy, and they scored shortly after it. Replay didn’t show whether or not Abdelkader tried to decline the fight, I think he should have and if he tried but couldn’t get out of it, I think that’s a play that needs the instigator penalty.

Never like to see people get hurt but it was interesting in that stretch where so many Sharks went down after blocking shots. I’ve noticed for awhile that it seems like the Red Wings would lose players to injury from blocking shots but their opponents never did, and kind of wondered about that. Again, don’t want to see it but the tables turning seemed like something that, statistically, should have happened awhile ago.

The big question after this one will be which goalie stays in Detroit when Jimmy Howard comes back on Tuesday. That’ll be answered tomorrow. Joey MacDonald has earned the backup role but the Red Wings organization is loyal and Ty Conklin wasn’t signed to play in Grand Rapids. We’ll see what happens.