The Detroit Red Wings have seen games spaced out since having a week off due to the All-Star Weekend festivities. Though they’ve entered into the gauntlet portion of their schedule, the Red Wings have held their own quite well.
Though they fell to the Wild Monday night in a 7-4 scoring fest, the Red Wings jumped out with two quick goals and had a stretch of dominance on the power play that exhausted the Wild and led to a Red Wings goal.
Detroit then went into New York and stole one from the Rangers in a thrilling 3-2 shootout victory. As I noted at the time:
The last two seasons, the Wings would fall apart after giving up that tying goal.
— Nate Brown (@NBrownChiHN) February 18, 2022
Tonight, they stayed in the game. Went toe to toe in OT. And stole it in the shootout.
Awesome to see. #LGRW
This is where things are becoming interesting. The Red Wings would be buried by teams like the Rangers, having the multiple goal death-spiral that often happened in succession after surrendering a lead. Instead they bore down and traded chances in an exciting overtime, where Dylan Larkin raced the length of the ice to stop a sure goal from Artemi Panarin.
Things are coming together. It makes for an easier viewing experience as a fan and it provides hope that things are starting to come around.
OT’s Detroit Red Wings Stories From the Week
Brendan made his debut on the site with a look at how the Rangers game was Detroit’s finest performance of the season. Delaney couldn’t hide her excitement at the return of Jakub Vrana, which seems to be inching closer.
Alex looked at the Calder Race, digging in a bit in the metrics and numbers and seeing who really is the leader at this point.
Chris looked at five potential trade deals that the Red Wings could make before or at the trade deadline. One in particular seemingly came true–just with the wrong team. Here was Chris’ thought on what they could get for Nick Leddy:
"Potential Trade: Nick Leddy to Toronto for Nick Ritchie and a conditional 2022 2nd round pick that slips to a 3rd round pick if Toronto doesn’t make it to the Conference Finals in 2022"
Hours after the story was published this happened:
Official: We've acquired forward Nick Ritchie and a conditional second round draft choice from the Toronto Maple Leafs in exchange for forward Ryan Dzingel and defenseman Ilya Lyubushkin.
— Arizona Coyotes (@ArizonaCoyotes) February 20, 2022
Details: https://t.co/NUVHig5sHK
Interesting…..Chris was pretty spot on with the return…just didn’t happen with the Red Wings.
Finally, I wrote about watching Dylan Larkin following in the footsteps of his boss and Detroit Red Wings legend Steve Yzerman. Sure, it’s not to the insane numbers Yzerman put up in a much different league, but Larkin is beginning to take steps toward that dominant first line center everyone envisioned.