TigerDan

Great story. I watched him play with Flint in Port Huron only a few months ago. It's great to see him back with the Wings. Nice work, D-mac!

I still think we need to sign Gerard Gallant out of retirement.

STFU Stop with the jinxing. I don't give a sh!t if the give the stupid trophy to fcuking Gerard Gallant. JUST WIN!!!!!!!

Filpulla.......SSSSCCCCCCOOOOOOOOORRRRRRREEEEESS

Chelios needs to be in tonight. Lilja drives me crazy with some of the careless plays he makes. Chelios should have been playing over him the entire time. I'm not as worried about Pitts team speed as much as I am about the way they have started creating turnovers. Chelios is one of the smartest player on the planet when he has the puck. Chelios making a breakout pass = no Pitt goals due to turnovers.

TY

I will not try to make any predictions. I hope the Wings come out and win and I hope it's not close, but the way Fluery is going, it's going to be interesting. I will say this: The Wings cannot come out an play nervous like they did in the first. We have plenty of experience, but the truth is the last time we had a team with this much inexperience in the finals was 1995. I think Babcock needs to lean on the guys that have been there a few times (ie. Draper line, Rafalski and Lidstrom - believe it or not, I don't think it would hurt to dress Chelios in place of Lilja either) early on to get the Wings settled down, then they need to play like they did from the middle of the second period on.

First time poster, but I've been as big a wing nut as anyone my whole life. I've played the game my whole life and have coached for a while too. It's safe to say that I have more than a basic knowledge of hockey. I say all that to lead to this: This is one of my biggest pet peaves with some of the Wings fans. I don't personally know anyone here, so I can't say anything about them. But, most of the negativity directed at Wings goaltenders over the last 15 years is due to a lack of in depth hockey knowledge. People need to realize that the Wings would be in the same place right now if Fleury was in net for us. Too many people see the opposing teams goalie stand on his head and say: "Osgood can't do that" and then blame a game like last night on Osgood. BULLSH!T. The reality is that the Wings defense will never dictate that a goalie needs to stand on his head. What does that mean? It means a goalie can play average, but never have a chance to make up for it with the fairweather fans by playing like Fleury did last night. The best Osgood can do towards "standing on his head" is show up and have a 20 save shutout (SEE: Game 1 and Game 2). Fluery, on the other hand cna have games where he was good, but not spectacular (once again, SEE: Game 1 and Game 2) and everyone thinks he's god because he stole a game last night. Any true hockey fan knows that Osgood stole his share of games with the Islanders and the Blues, too. Heck, the Isles have only made the playoffs twice in the last 10 years --- guess who their goalie was for those two years. The truth is if Fluery (0r anyone else) were the Wings goalie the best you'd see of him would match what Osgood did in the first two games. On top of that there is a big difference between stealing a game and costing a team a game. Last night, Fleury stole a game. Osgood did NOT cost us a game. Hasek DID cost us games 3 and 4 of the Nashville series (with poor goals). The goals scored on Osgood were not his fault. One was scored by our own defenseman and the tying goal that everyone complains about was probably the one that he had the least chance to stop. He had already made TWO saves and they scored on the third wack. Anyone that knows hockey knows this: When a shot comes from the slot (like the original shot did) and there is traffic down low, the defensemen need to clear the players and not allow them to get to rebounds. Not only did Pitt get to the rebound, they got to the second rebound as well. That is inexcusable -- Talbot should have been on his A$$. All of that said, the real reason we lost is that we played poorly in the first period. We came out flat and got down by two (bounces or no, Pitt had plenty of opportunities). In fact we started the 2nd poorly until we got a break of our own. If we played like we did in the 3rd, all of the rest is a moot point.