Game 6 Preview: Detroit Red Wings at Chicago Blackhawks

Not even 48 hours later, the Detroit Red Wings and Chicago Blackhawks are set battle for a matinee game. The Blackhawks won Friday’s contest 4-1 and the Red Wings, as written about previously, didn’t look very good in the effort. The Red Wings official Twitter account released this just recently:

Now we wait until the lines are announced. Until then:

3 Reasons For Hope

• If we’re to believe in patterns, the Red Wings have always played their opponent better the second time after dropping the first game during this short season. Again, the Blackhawks are in the spot as the Red Wings: rebuilding. It’s not farfetched to think the Wings should take this one.
• Jeff Blashill shook things up against Columbus and it resulted in a 3-2 OT win. The taxi squad announcement is hopefully just for shakeup purposes and not that more players are entering Covid Protocol.
• The goaltending tandem of Thomas Greiss and Jonathan Bernier has been stellar through five games. They’ve kept Detroit in every contest and it should hopefully be more of the same.

2 Reasons for Doom and Gloom

• The powerplay has been a glaring issue and one that has yet to really click. The first few games saw some sustained pressure but in five attempts (one negated by the Red Wings drawing their own penalty), they just couldn’t generate a good scoring chance. A lot of movement. Some shots blocked. It has to be better.
• Secondary scoring has been nonexistent. Someone on the bottom six not named Tyler Bertuzzi needs to score a goal.

1 Final Thought

I’ll be interested to see if Givani Smith or Taro Hirose find their way into the lineup. At this point, even if it’s ineffective, at least something else was tried to get this team rolling.

LGRW!