By Adam W Parks
Well the Wings are 0-2 on this all-important road trip that started out poorly in Phoenix and got worse in Colorado. Tonight they begin a three-game gauntlet through western Canada with a match-up against Vancouver. The Canucks (6-5-0) also suffered from a slow start at 0-3, but are now riding a recent trio of consecutive victories on the pads of Captain goaltender Roberto Luongo and the stick of a former Red Wing.
That’s right Wings fans, Mikael Samuelsson is second in points on Vancouver’s roster behind Henrik Sedin. With ten points, Samuelsson is ahead of all Red Wings as Henrik Zetterberg has nine. His five goals matches Tomas Holmstrom for Detroit’s high water mark on the season. His 46 shots on goal is second in the NHL behind only Alex Ovechkin (67) of Washington. Samuelsson left via free agency in July after four career-resurrecting seasons in Detroit and signed a three-year, $7.5 million contract with Vancouver. Another casualty of the salary cap, the Wings could only offer him $1 million more per year. Mathieu Schneider, who also spent four seasons in Detroit as Nicklas Lidstrom's defensive partner, will make just his second appearance tonight on the blue line for the Canucks.
Roberto Luongo is coming off a 2-0 shutout of the Oilers in Edmonton. He has only given up three goals in his past three starts, all resulting in road wins for the Canucks. He might be the hottest goalie in the NHL behind Craig Anderson of the Avalanche and Ilya Bryzgalov in Phoenix (despite Bryzgalov’s wretched start in New York where he gave up four goals on 11 shots against the Rangers). What a glorious, well-timed coincidence for the Wings. Tonight Luongo will be in net at home facing a desperate Detroit team that is struggling to score, and stop, goals.
Chris Osgood will get the start for Detroit tonight and will have to play better than he has so far this season to out-duel Luongo. Goaltending has been an issue for the Wings, but it has not necessarily been the problem. Detroit is ranked 17th in the NHL in goals scored (2.78 goals per game), whereas they were first in the league last season at 3.52 gpg. Nevertheless, Osgood and backup Jimmy Howard each have a goals-against average of over 3.00 and save percentages below .900. Giveaways have hurt the puck-stoppers in Detroit but so have bad, untimely, should-have-been-stopped goals. As the old cliche goes, sometimes the best defense is a good offense...hopefully this stagnant offense will get a wake-up call from a stellar start from Ozzie tonight.
Notes from Grand Rapids
The Griffins went 3-0 at home this weekend for their first games of the season in Grand Rapids as both the scoring and goaltending came alive. Daniel Larsson got the start in net on Friday and stopped 25 shots in a 5-3 win over the Abbotsford Heat. On Saturday Thomas McCollum, the Wings’ first round draft pick in 2008, also picked up 25 saves in a 4-3 shootout victory over the Toronto Marlies. Larsson was back between the pipes on Sunday with a brilliant near-shutout of the Heat, 6-1. He turned away 41 shots on net as the Heat scored their lone goal during a five-on-three power play with five minutes left in the third in what was a penalty-plagued period. 106 total penalty minutes were issued in that third session of hockey.
The scoring was well-rounded for the Griffins with forwards Jeremy Williams and Jamie Tardiff leading the way. Williams picked up a goal in each game and Tardiff watched the hats flutter around Van Andel for his three goals on Sunday. Grizzled NHL travelman Michael Nylander helped lead the Griffins with five assists on the weekend, tallying three on Friday and two on Sunday. Similar to Detroit (3-4-2), Grand Rapids is now 3-4-1 on the season, and, like the Wings, they appear to be a much more confident team at home than on the road thus far.
Peace.
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