The Detroit Red Wings surrender fourth straight loss

The last time the Detroit Red Wings won a regular season game during regulation play in Philadelphia was back in 1997.  That seems so bizarre, yet true.  The trend would unfortunately continue tonight.  The Flyers beat the Wings 3-2 tonight.

The Detroit Red Wings came out flat-footed once again tonight.  What else is new?  Somehow these players need to start these hockey games on time.  We can blame the coaching staff, but it comes to a point and time where the players need to decide to amp up their effort.

The Flyers started Carter Hart in goal tonight.  It was his NHL debut, he is highly touted and is expected to be a star.  Although he is still a little “green” he looked very solid and confident tonight.  I would have liked the Detroit Red Wings to put a bit more pressure on him, especially early in the hockey game.

Unfortunately, the Red Wings kept pace with another one of their trends this season.  The visits to the penalty box.  In the first 10 minutes of the game, Michael Rasmussen was called for interference and then roughly three minutes later the Wings were tagged with too many men on the ice.  Although the Flyers were unable to score on the PP, it stopped any offensive momentum the Wings hoped to force.

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We saw the good and the bad from rookie Dennis Cholowski tonight.  He’s been a very valuable defender for the Wings now and moving forward.  We can’t expect him to be perfect.  Cholowski recorded a PP goal tonight for the Wings.  He was left all alone in the slot and buried a beauty past Hart.  It was Cholo’s 8th point this season on the PP.  He now has 6 goals and 14 points on the season.

The bad was when Cholo carried the puck up to the Flyer blueline and turned it over leading to a Flyers four on one.  Well, it was nearly a four on two but Christoffer Ehn was trying to play defense and it didn’t end well.  The Flyers went tick-tack-toe around a sprawling Trevor Daley.  The kid will learn, instead of trying to make a dangerous pass through traffic, just bunch it deep and try to retrieve.  Learn to live for another day in this case opportunity.

Flyers got a first-period goal from James van Riemsdyk and added a pair of second-period goals from Gudas and the kid they call ghost (Shayne Gostisbehere).  Jacob de La Rose would itch the Wings closer with his second goal of the season.  Martin Frk centered the puck from in behind the Flyers goal to a wide-open de La Rose.  He quickly snapped it past Hart to make it 3-2, which would be how this one would end.

Something to keep an eye on;  Jimmy Howard was expected to start tonight but hurt his back during the warm-ups.  It was apparently bad enough that Howard was unable to dress and serve as the back-up to Bernier tonight.

The Detroit Red Wings were forced to dress an emergency goaltender to sit on the bench in case something were to happen to Bernie.  Luckily nothing did.  The emergency goalie is a “beer league” tender who plays once or twice a week.

Justin Kowalkoski is a Geologist for Roux Company and he played four years at Colgate from 2004-08.  This was the second time he has had to dress and sit on an NHL bench.  He dressed once in Philly for the Pittsburgh Penguins one other time. A pretty cool story for that guy to tell the rest of his life.

With Howie unable to even dress has us expecting a call to Grand Rapids tomorrow.  The Detroit Red Wings will be in need of a goaltender for Thursday night to back up Bernier once again.