Detroit looks to head into the 4 Nations break with an eighth straight win
Saturday afternoon at Little Caesars Arena, the Detroit Red Wings will host the Tampa Bay Lightning in the team's final game before the 4 Nations Face-Off break that will keep them out of action for the bulk of February.
"I dislike the last and first games coming out of All-Star breaks or Christmas breaks or whatever, just because it can get away on you," Todd McLellan cautioned after Friday's practice. "One o'clock in the afternoon game, [the players] are probably waking up in the morning, and some of their wives got bags packed for the kids already and stuff like that. We have a task in front of us, and we expect a lot from each other. So while there will be distractions and things that can pull you away from the game, expectations are high that we give each other everything we have."
Lineup
Per McLellan, the Red Wings are expecting J.T. Compher to return to the lineup for the first time since the last time Detroit hosted the Bolts (Jan. 25) when he suffered an upper body injury. McLellan also said the Red Wings would be turning to Alex Lyon for the start in goal. Expect the Detroit lineup in front of him to be as follows:
Lightning Youngster Set for Debut
Friday evening, Tampa recalled former University of Michigan forward Dylan Duke from AHL Syracuse, opening the door for the Wolverine alumnus to make his NHL debut Saturday afternoon. Saturday is a double-header at Little Caesars Arena, with U-M taking on Michigan State in the annual "Duel in the D" at 8 pm after the Red Wings-Lightning matinee. Duke's younger brother Tyler will be playing on the blue line for the Wolverines in that game. Suffice it to say, it's set to be a big day at LCA for the Duke family.
Feisty History?
While Compher wound up with an injury coming out of the last meeting between these two teams at LCA, that play wasn't the one that sparked the most controversy from that game. Instead, that game when Michael Rasmussen clinched the game via an empty-netter, only to be upturned and sent crashing into the net by a Nikita Kucherov slash to the ankle. That made for a feisty end to what had already been a hotly contested game.
However, when asked Friday about a possible response to Kucherov's slash heading into Saturday's game, McLellan expressed a desire to avoid the distraction of such extra-curriculars, saying, "I want to see us play a good hard hockey game. Ras is fine. We can think about that all we want, but where we're at, what we've accomplished to this point, we need to keep moving the team forward. And the focus has to be on playing hard and playing a good 60 minutes. It takes everybody to beat them, and that's what our focus will be on."
Bookmark The Hockey News Detroit Red Wings team site to stay connected to the latest news, game-day coverage, and player features. Never miss a story by adding us to your Google News favorites.