The Pasha and Sasha Show; Detroit Red Wings: 3 – Colorado Avalanche: 2

April 5 2013; Denver, CO, USA; Detroit Red Wings center

(14) is congratulated for his goal by teammate left wing

(93) during the first period of the game against the Colorado Avalanche at the Pepsi Center. Mandatory Credit: Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports

I’m tired of the Wings taking me on this emotional roller coaster.

Blowout loss to the Hawks -> Solid win against the Avalanche -> Embarrassing loss to the Coyotes -> Barely won against the Avalanche

Make up your damn minds. Because I can deal with being a playoff team, and I can deal with being awful for the rest of the season and getting a high draft pick. But I can’t deal with being a playoff bubble team that’s in denial about how bad they are. Holland’s inactivity at the deadline made me nervous – I’m glad he didn’t trade away the future, but I really think Valtteri Filppula and Ian White shoulda been on their way out. They could have easily fetched a 1st round pick a piece at least (rhyme points)…sigh. I really don’t wanna be the next Calgary.

At least the game started off well. The whole team put good pressure on the Avs, and newcomer Danny Dekeyser looked good – he made a few errors, but looked remarkably poised and calm…and damn, the kid can skate. Datsyuk opened the scoring on the powerplay 8:27 into the period off an effortless tic-tac-toe passing play between him, Johan Franzen, and Henrik Zetterberg. The score probably would have stayed that way for a while if it wasn’t for awful coverage by Jakub Kindl and Kyle Quincey, who played the wrong man and pinched, respectively, to let Colorado’s Mark Olver waltz in unattended and lift a beautiful backhand over Jimmy Howard to tie the score at 1. Nyquist had an answer with an even prettier goal just 13 seconds later however – he picked the pocket of the Avalanche defenseman deep in their zone and deked the pants off of Giguere to put the Wings ahead.

The score stayed 2-1 throughout the second period, which saw the Wings taper off and let the Avalanche come on a little bit harder. Still, the Avs only had 3 scoring chances after 40 minutes of play, so no one was really *that* worried.

Wow, were we wrong.

The third period was awful. Like, second period against the Coyotes awful. Scoring chance after scoring chance came from Colorado at Jimmy Howard, who, though he looked less-than-stellar, still only let in one goal off of many more shots. The goal came 6:29 into the period off the shaft of P.A. Parenteau‘s stick, who also happens to lead the Avs in scoring. By the way, Kindl and Quincey were on the ice for that too. Sit them. Detroit looked absolutely terrible before and after the goal, and had no more than a handful of shots through the period. Whatever, it was the end of a back to back, they were playing at altitude, etc. Darren Elliot is payed to make the Wings look good. Fire him, bring Murph back. Anyway, overtime ensued, which is more than Detroit should have hoped for after a period like that. And wow, what an overtime it was. The period showcased some of the best back and forth hockey we’ve seen all season – Datsyuk and Zetterberg still have more chemistry than perhaps any other pair of forwards in the league. They capped off overtime with a great passing play that ended with Datsyuk casually poking the puck past Giguere with barely a minute remaining to end the game and capture a much needed two points.

Oh, and Kronwall Kronwalled someone. Finally. It took 37 games. Sigh.

Notes:

– Kindl and Quincey looked awful. Absolutely awful. Time to dress Smith and Colaiocavo.

– Dekeyser had one little series of flubs in his second shift, but looked great otherwise. He’ll be with Detroit for a long time. Hopefully he develops a mean streak – our blue line needs that.

– Gustav Nyquist is good.

Thanks for reading! Sorry for the lack of substance, but I’m feeling a little flu-y, and it’s late. Follow me on twitter, or I’ll come to your home and get you sick! @dzkefalas