Three Takeaways from the Red Wings' Loss to Ottawa
Notes on Marco Kasper, Austin Watson, and another sluggish effort from the Red Wings' veterans in a 4-3 OT loss to the Senators Friday night
Detroit, MI—On Friday night at Little Caesars Arena, the Detroit Red Wings fell 4-3 in overtime to the visiting Ottawa Senators. Detroit raced out of the gate courtesy of two goals from Marco Kasper in the game's opening 10 minutes. The Red Wings would stretch that lead to 3-1 courtesy of a Vladimir Tarasenko goal (off a pretty J.T. Compher banked set up) with just under five minutes to play in regulation. However, Ottawa scored twice in a minute and three seconds late in the third, then Noah Gregor nabbed the OT winner just 19 seconds into the extra session.
For the Red Wings, the result is clearly an uninspiring one—another defeat for an NHL-laden line-up on home ice against with prospective AHLers all over the visiting lineup. Detroit, however, is far from the only team to drop a game this pre-season despite boasting an obvious advantage on the line-up card, and the night wasn't devoid of bright spots, particularly Kasper.
"Obviously, we'd like to manage the game a little better in the end," assessed Lalonde. "I thought the poor penalty kill probably got them back in it, maybe a little urgency, but I liked our game. Pick some parts about it, what you don't like, you do like. It's part of the—I'm not gonna go as far as frustration of the pre-season, but the reality of the pre-season."
Here are a few observations on the evening's action:
Kasper's Argument Gets Louder
Steadily throughout the pre-season, Marco Kasper has been building the case that Detroit's NHL roster must feature his name come October 10th and the season opener. Much of that argument comes from the subtleties of Kasper's game, the ways in which he shows a maturity beyond his 20 years of age, whether in his anticipation to find and combine with his teammates offensive zone or his defensive reliability. On Friday, Kasper made his argument even louder and more obvious by potting a pair of goals.
"It's always fun to score," an almost sheepish Kasper said from the post-game podium before re-centering the importance of the evening's result, rather than his own individual success. "It's just trying to win the game and help the team win. I think it's always good to score for me, for the team to just get two quick goals, and now we got to work on keeping the lead and not losing games like that."
To coach Derek Lalonde, the difference in Kasper's game from this time last year to day is less physical than mental. "I think just the confidence, managing his game, puck play," he gushed when asked what's stood out from his pre-season and training camp after the game. "You guys saw last year [in pre-season], he looked like a deer in the headlights—turning pucks over all over the place, opening himself up to hits. It's a credit for him how much he's developed in a year. Probably a credit to the guys in Grand Rapids. He had a really good camp, and he's an exciting player for us."
Perhaps most notable about that final clause is the absence of a temporal qualifier. Kasper isn't "an exciting player for us" down the road or eventually. He's an exciting player right now, and as the pre-season has progressed, it's become nearly impossible to argue against his inclusion in Detroit's opening night roster.
Watson a Spark Plug in Fiery Game
Pre-season hockey is often full of penalty minutes, but tonight's clash between Ottawa and Detroit was decidedly nastier than any of the Red Wings' other pre-season engagements to date. The first period brought with it a series of minor post-whistle skirmishes, eventually escalating into a tussle between Austin Watson and the Senators' Jan Jenik and Zack MacEwan. The conflict began as a bout between Moritz Seider and Jenik, before Watson inserted himself. The end result was 41 minutes of penalties, including 27 for Watson himself, which put the Senators onto a seven-minute power play.
Lalonde appreciated Watson taking up for Seider much more than he minded the penalty minutes, saying of Watson's role in the incident, "I like that. I thought it energized our guys. Obviously, Mo's a very important player for us. We don't want him to get into any of those type of situations, but I actually liked it a lot." "It's amazing just one guy with that mentality just helps the group out a ton, and again, up to that point, Austin was good in his game," he added. "[He] kills for us. He had a beautiful Grade A chance backdoor five-on-five. He's done some great things with his play also."
Watson is of course in Red Wings camp on a PTO, but Lalonde's high praise suggests a full-time contract could well be in short order. It's worth noting that Detroit could very well sign Watson, then send him to Grand Rapids (after he passes through waivers), but Lalonde's words suggest there's more than a faint chance he dresses on opening night next Thursday.
Veterans "Getting What They Need" in Yet Another Sluggish Effort
At a collective level, it's hard not to raise an eyebrow at another performance in which an NHL-heavy Red Wing lineup falls to a group loaded with presumptive minor leaguers, though again they are far from the only team to fall into that trap this fall.
Detroit's effort through 40 minutes was unambiguously its most intense of the pre-season. The Red Wings applied forechecking pressure, exited quickly and cleanly to minimize time spent in the defensive zone, and showed a sense of urgency to drive quality chances that had been absent for long spells in some of the less energized contests of the last two weeks. However, that intensity clearly dissipated after Tarasenko made it 3-1 as the game spiraled into a 4-3 OT defeat.
"The good thing is it doesn't count yet, but I think we gotta figure out how to close those games out," assessed Olli Maatta. "I think the structure's not bad, but it's the compete. And always these games, whoever competes more wins and you can see it throughout the league that NHL lineups lose to AHL lineups just because of compete."
"A little of it is probably pre-season," said Lalonde, when asked about apparent swings in intensity from his team. "A little of it is the unfortunate reality sometimes of veteran type players getting what they need out of exhibition. I don't love. You push back against it as a coach, because I don't think you can just turn it on when the games start here on Thursday."
Maatta's first point is perhaps the most salient one: these games don't count, and they'll be forgotten easily when the real action begins. Pre-season results are a notoriously poor predictor of what follows; last year's lone exhibition unbeaten (New Jersey) wound up among the league's most disappointing teams. With that said, Lalonde's point about the peril of believing a switch can be flipped to summon the requisite intensity of winning NHL hockey also rings true. It certainly can't be a positive to deliver another of these stale performances—or at least a stale period—against inferior competition.
Lalonde indicated that Detroit will send an AHL-heavy lineup to Toronto in the pre-season finale, so this was likely the last pre-season action for a number of the Red Wings' top gunners, who will get their chance to prove the rust's been knocked off next Thursday when the Penguins come to town, and the points do count in the standings.
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