Firehawk

It would be really nice to see the Red Wings offense score some goals in this 3rd. So far Kindl and Adbelkader have scored, not exactly goal scorers. That's good if we get everyone contributing. Boy I'd love to see the Wings run it up 6-3 final!

Im' not going to be that mad at Howard for that goal becuase it was such a hard shot that came out perfectly, but Howard reacts very slowly to shots. I don't know what the deal is. He is slow getting post to post and he needs to really work on moving faster. He also needs to work on rebounds. Today he's been fine though in my opinion.

If we continue to play well I can accept a loss today. But I think we are at least going to tie this game up. Would love to at least get a point out of it and tighten the noose around at least keeping 3rd spot. To me as that period got later in the period, it seemed to me the wings were taking too many perimeter shots. I hate that. Crash the net boys.

Sometimes I wonder if the league is tired of detroit, or wants to give other teams the spotlight. Having 20 years of being the best team in the league or close to it, I could see that. I thought this way the entire SJ series last year.

It's about ******* time we get an interference call go our way. Give me a break. How much more OBVIOUS does it have to be?

Aren't the power plays 7-2? If that was an objective 7 to 2 then fine, but it's not. Ridiculous.

You know what, speaking about bertuzzi, How long have some of us been ABSOLUTELY CLAMOURING for Bert to be mean spirited for us? Since he's been here, I have been saying "where's that hard nasty, snarling spirit from Bertuzzi?" Oh I hope he keeps that snarl now. We need a power forward with an attitude.

YEQAH BABY! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! WOOOOHOOHOOO

Great goal out of nowhere. We're still in this. Come on wings, get another one and it's us back in business.

That 3rd goal was not a goal resulting from giving up. That goal I am not even going to blame on Howard on that. I love Bertuzzi now. He is now my favorite red wing player.

Here we go with the Bulls*** goals now. My God. Let's go wings come on. Imagine how different this game would be had the homer goal counted.

I disagree. If you want to argue the non-goal that's cool. But I don't think they're being overly aggressive. I love it, and I think they need to keep it up. We got scored on because of an unfortunate 5 on 3 (no gripe on that, the ref had to call that 2nd penalty, more annoyed with the first penalty). I LOVE this out of the wings. We usually see this kind of play only in the playoffs when they're on. We'll be ok if we keep this up.

I feel the exact same way.

Dude, the refs don't need an excuse. How long you been watching the NHL? They will just call something if they want to. It can be blatently not a penalty and they'll call it. It's so ******* aggravating. And I am not just saying that becuase I'm a wings fan. They do that with all teams. The refs deliberately don't call things sometimes, whethere it's because they think they are calling too many penalties or whatever reason. In my opinion the league needs to make the refs as OBJECTIVE as possible. You see it, YOU CALL IT. Unbelievable. The wings are playing very well. I hope they continue to take it to Nashville. We'll win if we keep that play up.

Yeah, I don't know how anyone can ever say the refs just call what they see and 'miss calls'. Bull s***. They choose not to call penalties sometimes, which is BULLs***. If you see it, CALL IT. If you don't see it, don't assume and call it, DONT CALL IT. Clearly refs choose to not call things at times. It's bulls*** man.

Forget this goal. I don't know how anyone can honestly say the refs call what they see and that there is not some kind of conspiring going on. Not necessarily against one specific team, but in general. There are penalties occurring with the ref looking at it and they decide not to call it. It's just unbelievable. The no goal on Homer was just stupid. Is this the sissy league or what? Why was the even a call on the hit on Erat? Becuase he looked injured? Was a great hit, Erat had his head down and got his bell rung. Too ******* BAD. This is why the NHL sucks and is just getting worse. It's f***in pathetic.

Love the posts so far LOL. On a serious note, I think we are going to learn a lot about where our team is with this game. Expect Nashville to show up big for this one. They're one of the teams on fire, they're gunning for us, have had success against us this year, and are sniffing that they have a very good shot at ending up in 3rd place in the conference. I think if we come out flat and get handled again, I think we're in for real trouble. If we come out hard and take it to them and play solid defense, then hopefully that game the other night will be the turning point for this team and we can get to the Wings Hockey we all know and have come to love.

Well, I wake up this morning and see we are now 3rd in the conference. I really hope this is not the beginning of a free fall. So frustrating.

You are certainly right in that what happens in October or December doesn't matter when the playoffs start. You can also say here that what you do all the way up to the last game of the regular season doesn't have any bearing on the playoffs either, two separate situations. SO, what you really mean to say then, is it doesn't matter what they do right now anyway, only when the playoffs start. Fine. I hope you are right and the playoffs bring the wings back to the wings we know well. But it didn't last year. We struggled with a Phoenix team who wasn't really that good, and was filled with a bunch of no-name players around Doan. Nobody knew who they were and the media did a great job building them up, just like they always do. Then we got manhandled by SJ, who is a good team. Unlike years past (with the exception of last year), the wings have not shown these kinds of signs. Fans have always been skeptical of any goalie, but when Lidstrom starts getting burned, which NONE of us are used to seeing, Rafalski is playing with braces on all over his body, the 3rd and 4th guys are just average, and the 5th and 6th pairing absolutely sucks, I don't know how you can excuse this. These signs have been shown all year long. I wanna believe that for 10 games, or 9, that they have hopefully gotten it back together a bit, but the longer term states otherwise. You know, I think the hard part for most of us fans that have been watching this team for 20 years or less, is that we are going to have to admit very soon here that we are not the team to beat anymore. Vancouver, San Jose, Chicago, those are the teams that we are now using to judge ourselves. We used to be the ruler. I don't think that is the case anymore. I think some fans here have a tough time coming to grips with that.

It's completely rational, because it's: A) Possible B) Likely, considering what we've been seeing. In case you weren't aware, if Nashville wins tonight, that puts them within 4, and then they have us on Saturday. If they win that, they're within 2. Suddenly it's not looking very good. Then, we have the daunting task of playing Chicago in back to back games. Chicago is trying to MAKE the playoffs, so they have a ton to play for and have something to prove against the red wings. The other two are Minnesota and Carolina. Carolina is trying to get into the playoffs, and Minnesota sucks, just like we thought the Blues Did. I'm sorry, but you need to look at the schedule. We can easily lose 4 of the next 5, EASILY. It's not a really likely scenario like you say, but it's a possible situation, very possible in fact.

Ok, let's look at the entire season to this point. 226 goals allowed over 77 games equals over a 2.93 goals per game average. That's good for the worst defensive team IN THE PLAYOFFS RIGHT NOW except for Tampa Bay who has given up 230 with one less game played. It's unbelievable. What was the stat for the goals scored in the last 10 games? Because that number has also been down substantially. The stat that matters less with regard to offense is that the wings have the 2nd best offense out of all the playoff teams currently in the league. This matters less because defense wins championships.

How about pride? How about the fact that you have a bad defensive team statistically? Under Bowman I think that was the motivation. I would love to know how Bowman got them motivated to be stingy and take it personal when they got scored on, because Bowman had them believing allowing a goal was like getting shot or something. I don't think many vets liked Bowman, not even Yzerman at first, but they were convinced to change and then started winning like crazy. Well, Babcock has won a cup here with them. I just think something with the chemistry is wrong. When have we known a wings team not to be hard working? I mean that's all we've been hearing for many years, even from free agents that come here, that the wings are the hardest working team off the ice that they've seen? Is that just smoke up our butts? Maybe it is. Clearly something is off though. I don't think it's somethign shallow either, like bad bounces or breaks. I think it's something with the chemistry, albeit the coach/players, the team hates one of the players, there is division in the room, etc. Something is just 'off'.

This is in my opinion, one of the best posts I have seen lately. I don't know how anyone can look at this game and say "it's one bad game, the wings are fine". They have been showing this kind of play since at least New Years. It's this lackluster (we'll win it at the end) mentality. I am not used to seeing this out of the Wings. I have been a fan since I was a kid, back in 92 I think when the Wings came back from 3 games to 1 against the North Stars and then lost in 7 to Toronto if I'm not mistaken. I love the Wings. But when they play like this and over a long period of time, I have every right as a fan to: A. Turn off the game and not waste my time. B. Criticize my team where I feel pertinent. I did B yesterday, but managed to watch the train wreck. When i twas 9-3 I actually started WISHING they would make it 10. I do not remember seeing any team put 10 goals up on the Wings ever. But hell, we're that close, let's see it. What I wish for is that they come out of this with their heads on straight now and say "boy we have been sucking, let's get it going". I think Saturday will say a lot. IF the wings come to play and win, or even do very well but still lose on a bad break or something, then I will feel a little better. But if they go to Nashville and play another bad game, I think we are in for a short playoff, and I think by then we'll be looking at 5th-6th in the final standings. This thing has gone south in a hurry. With regard to replacing Babcock, I have wondered this. I think babs is a great coach, maybe the best in the league now, and I love him. But things may have gotten stale. Maybe the vets don't like being yelled at or something. I don't know. We don't know what's going on in the locker room, but boy it sure seems like the chemistry is off with this team. There's far too much talent on this team to be playing like they have been. I judge goalies based on how they allow goals, not how many they allow. Macdonald is completely not to blame yesterday. I don't believe he allowed one bad goal. When teams are getting open pops at pucks right in front of him what's he suppposed to do? I maintain that game could have been 20-3 had he not played well. When the defense does their job and goals go in then I start wondering about the goalie a bit, depending of course, on the situation (like the other night when Howard let 4 in and got pulled and we came back to tie). But right now, I'd still play Howard, find out what we have this playoff with him, find out if he's made of steel or not. This off season we may be due for a decent shakeup if the wings get bounced in round 1.

Which goal do you think was a bad goal tonight? Every one of them have been bad breaks or a very good shot. If Howard were in we'd be losing by 4.

Geezus call a time out babs. The wheels have fallen off.