As the Red Wings take on the Pittsburgh Penguins, take a look at lineups, playoff implications and Sidney Crosby's dominant finish
As the Red Wings take on the Pittsburgh Penguins, take a look at lineups, playoff implications and Sidney Crosby's dominant finish
The Detroit Red Wings’ postseason odds all come down to tonight’s game in Pittsburgh. Lose, and they won’t make the playoffs; win and they stay alive in the playoff hunt.
Such high stakes have practically lost their meaning these past two weeks. Every game has been huge in a playoff race against four other teams, but this one brings a sense of finality. It’s important that Detroit plays its best hockey, otherwise it might not play much more.
“To have an opportunity right here — we might not be here next year, you look at some of these lineups and teams they’re growing … there’s teams around us,” Detroit coach Derek Lalonde said Wednesday. “You don’t get these opportunities and we’re in one. So we had an opportunity last night (against Washington), we came up short. We have an opportunity tomorrow night against Pittsburgh, we would like to seize that opportunity.”
Seizing that opportunity will take the kind of high-quality hockey the Red Wings played Tuesday against the Capitals. They controlled possession and took a high number of shots, but they got goalied by Charlie Lindgren and lost. Overall, the process of that game was right where the Red Wings need to be — they’re just running out of room to convert that hockey into results in the standings.
“I think we’ve all been in games like that where you’re dominating and control the pace of play, and then all of a sudden they get one and they get two and it’s like you start pressing a bit,” Patrick Kane said Wednesday. “But yeah, I think if we play like that the rest of the way out we should be in good shape.” Kane
Thursday night in Pittsburgh, the Red Wings will need to capitalize on their chances and put away a resilient Penguins team that was once left for dead in the playoff race. Now, Pittsburgh is 6-1-3 in its last 10 games, sparked in part by timely play from former Red Wings goaltender Alex Nedeljkovic. The last time these two teams met, Pittsburgh controlled play from the final minutes of the first period onward and won 6-3.
The Lineup
With Andrew Copp out with a broken cheekbone and Michael Rasmussen still recovering from his upper body injury, the Red Wings’ forward corps lost two of its best matchup players. Against a Penguins team with elite offensive creators in Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, losing such defensive stalwarts is a big loss in the biggest game of the year.
The Red Wings called up Zach Aston-Reese — a former Penguin — to fill in for Copp, constructing new lines in the process.
Alex DeBrincat, Dylan Larkin and Lucas Raymond will play together, hoping to rekindle their early season dominance. David Perron, J.T. Compher and Patrick Kane will make up the second line. Lalonde hasn’t split up DeBrincat and Kane much in the past few months, but this move might be able to extract some more offense. While Kane has played well in recent weeks with six goals in his past nine games, DeBrincat has nosedived. A player brought in for his goal scoring, he has one goal in his past 19 games. Maybe the new top six lines can get him going again, but Detroit desperately needs him to show up in its biggest moment.
Robby Fabbri, Joe Veleno and Daniel Sprong provide an offense-focused third line, with Lalonde unable to craft his usual matchup third line with Copp and Rasmussen out of the lineup. With the stakes of this game, I would expect the top six to get significantly more ice time than this line, and the fourth line isn’t likely to play much at all. Lalonde has rolled his top three lines the past few games, and the stakes of this game might only reinforce such a decision.
Copp’s loss and Rasmussen’s continued injury absence significantly hurt the Red Wings’ penalty kill unit as two of its biggest pieces. Pittsburgh’s power play is second worst in the league at 14.3% and 3-for-28 (10.7%) in its past 10 games. Maybe Detroit can survive this potential mismatch, but stars like Crosby, Malkin, Kris Letang and Erik Karlsson always have the potential to cash in.
On defense, Jake Walman continues to be a semi-healthy scratch. He’s able to play, as Lalonde noted earlier this week, but he isn’t at full health. But with Simon Edvinsson thriving in the lineup, Walman’s spot in the lineup is filled enough that the Red Wings don’t need to rush him back. What it says about his role that he isn’t playing in the biggest moment of the season — injury or not — is nonetheless something to note.
Alex Lyon will get the start in net for the sixth straight game. He’s 2-2-1 in his previous five games, four of which came above a .910 save percentage. He’s been enough in net for Detroit to win, and he will have to play well in this game, too, if his team is going to win.
For Pittsburgh, Nedeljkovic will start. Its practice lines looked like this:
Sidney Crosby Willing the Penguins Forward
At the trade deadline, the Penguins were all but counted out of the playoff race. They sold at the deadline, moving star forward Jake Guentzel. They were expected to bow out.
Sidney Crosby had other ideas.
The 36-year-old forward has 17 points during the Penguins nine-game point streak. That accounts for his hand in 47.2% of their goals. He has points in 13 of 17 games since the deadline. He also tied Wayne Gretzky for 19 point-per-game seasons in his career. He’s putting Pittsburgh on his back and chugging along with a city’s dreams in tow.
“It’s been impressive just because you thought they were out of the playoff picture around the trade deadline,” Kane said. “They’ve had quite a run and he’s leading the charge. He’s still as good as ever.”
Kane said that Crosby is an area of focus himself for the Red Wings this game, who have to make sure to limit him in the offensive zone. It’s a credit to Crosby’s talent that he can produce like this so late in his career. If anyone can appreciate Crosby’s own battles with age and production, it’s Kane, who came off hip surgery to have an explosive, nearly point-per-game season with Detroit.
It takes a lot to not only stay in playing shape, but also to remain a potent scorer. He might not be the exact same player that led the Penguins past the Red Wings in the 2009 Stanley Cup Final, or rattled off Cups in 2016 and 2017. But, he’s as impactful as ever, as this recent stretch shows.
Where to Watch
After two games on national broadcasts, tonight’s 7 p.m. ET puck drop can be found on Bally Sports Detroit, with Ken Daniels and Mickey Redmond on the call. The game can also be streamed on Hulu and ESPN+
Scoreboard Watch
Other playoff-hunting teams are playing tonight, too. Here’s where to find them.
Philadelphia Flyers at New York Rangers, 7 p.m., ESPN+
Washington Capitals at Buffalo Sabres, 7 p.m., ESPN+
Montreal Canadiens at New York Islanders, 7:30 p.m., ESPN+
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