From The Silky Mitten State: Detroit's depth along the blue line showing up with understated importance to playoff push
Sometimes, you can get a bit too close to a situation to appreciate it, so you need an outside perspective to remind you what you have. Such may be the case for Red Wings fans and the Detroit blue line.
“There’s some deep D corps, but when you have Justin Holl and [Jake] Walman sitting in the stands, it’s pretty deep,” Washington coach Spencer Carbery said when the Capitals came to town last week. “And I feel like they — from a mobility standpoint on the back end with [Shayne] Gostisbehere and obviously [Moritz] Seider in that — they can do some things that in this building, Gostisbehere was a real handful for us playing his off side, one-timer option, getting up in the rush. I feel like just the overall depth of the roster and their team, it’s just been very much improved and so you’re not getting any breaks in any lines or any D pair that are going to give you a free shift.”
The Red Wings might not have a surplus of elite talent on its defense corps, but they do have a robust crop of experienced and established NHL defensemen to say nothing of the boost provided by 21-year-old Simon Edvinsson (perhaps well on his way to elite).
Last night against the Canadiens, that depth manifest in Gostisbehere (a semi-regular scapegoat amongst Detroit fans) saving the season with a leaping keep-in as the Red Wings pushed for an empty-net goal to tie the game and save the season on the way to a 5-4 overtime victory.
On the most recent episode of The Silky Mitten State, my co-host Connor Earegood and I discussed the importance of Detroit's defensive depth. Here's a sample of that conversation:
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