J-Swift

Oh, I'm with you on that one. The Wings are usually responsible for guys like Ellis, Roloson and the relatively-unknown-at-the-time J.S. Giguere look good. When Detroit simply refuses to just go to the net and bury the chances they get, we essentially give the opposing goalie all the confidence he'd ever need.

Nothing quite like getting stonewalled by another no-name goalie. There is no way this game should be tied.

I agree. The Preds forechecking is really getting to them and they're making really sloppy plays. Nashville actually outshot us this period. How often does that happen?

What ever happened to the Wings getting all the calls?

Wow. Stuart was walked around pretty easy there. Nice save by Dom.

VS announcers saying Datsyuk sold that? Um. I really don't think so. We need to start burying these chances.

Here's the link somebody else posted for those wanting the feed: mms://a1729.l2168647534.c21686.g.lm.akamaistream.net/D/1729/21686/v0001/reflector:54953 Weak call by the way.

I feel your pain man. I don't care what golf tournament it is, golf does not come before playoff hockey. Just use that link was posted until TSN decides to show the game.

Any other Canadians here not getting to watch the game? TSN has it on their schedule, but at the moment they are showings golf. This is awfully frustrating.

McCarty's game has been on the downturn since before the lockout even started. I really don't think it's fair for Downey, who fought for a spot in training camp and patiently played his role all season, to have his spot given away to McCarty.

Spoken like a true Wings fan. Also, from now on, you may consider reading what's put in quotations before you comment on a post. I'll be interested to see if Fedorov has any playoff magic left. Has he been any good since he came to Washington?

A good chunk of the fanbase most certainly is. Have you never heard the boos in Joe Louis arena when Fedorov touches the puck? I'm not even saying Sergei doesn't deserve to get his number retired, but unless he comes back at some point, I really don't see it happening.

If Nashville winds up beating Detroit, it will almost certainly be in large part to top-notch goaltending by Ellis. The Wings have a tendency to make slightly above average goaltenders really, really good. We were the ones who put J.S. Giguere and Dwayne Roloson on the map. Ellis' performance the other day made me pretty nervous. But I don't mind playing Nashville simply for the travel reasons. Staying up past 1 o'clock for an over-time game in Western Canada can get pretty aggravating. I expect this series to go six games and resemble our last series with Nashville or our series with Calgary last year. Detroit should take a couple games early on, but the Predators will make it interesting by winning when they get back to Nashville.

Do you really believe our playoff hopes rest on whether Babcock chooses to sit Jiri Hudler?

Oh please. Don't categorize me as some Hudler fan boy. I've never been sold on him, and I'm not even saying he should be in the lineup in the post-season. But he looked very good in the offensive zone last night, in spite of some questionable plays in his own end.

I'd never expect you to be so tough on Ozzie. Only the over-time goal looked a little soft to me. Initially I thought the third Blues goal was weak, but the replay shows it deflecting off Lidstrom's leg. As for Hudler, he made some horrible plays in his own end last night, but I thought he actually looked really good in the offensive zone. And Flip was great in his first game back.

Yeah, Lilja's probably a better defenceman than Lebda. But a Chelios-Lilja pairing wouldn't exactly be the fleetest of foot would it? You'd certainly have to limit their even-strength time, because I could totally see them getting exploited by a faster team that knew how to fore-check.

Sorry if it's already been posted, but here's Melrose's in-depth analysis of who lost at the trade deadline. Any idea what prominent Western Conference team Melrose refers to as a loser today?

If it makes you guys feel better, LA fans over at the HF Boards seem to think they got fleeced in this deal. So I guess our D looks something like this: Lidstrom-Rafalski Kronwall-Stuart Chelios-Lebda You could probably switch Lebda with Lilja, but a Chelios/Lilja pairing would be painfully slow in the post-season.

Yeah, I really hated hearing those kind of comments coming from Holland during the summer, because the asking price for decent players at the deadline is absolutely ridiculous. You really think Franzen will be centering our second line? Having Samuelsson on the team is just kind of annoying. He doesn't have the offensive instincts to be put in a scoring role, and he's not physical enough to be used in a checking/energy-line role.

As I see it, Stuart's a better acquisition than Cory Cross was two years ago. I even like Stuart more than Gill, which is a name I've seen thrown around here lately. For those of you who don't watch Leafs games often, Hal Gill is Toronto's version of Andreas Lilja. But the fact remains that Mikael Samuelsson is still in our top six, and I think that's a pretty serious problem.

As was the case last year, it's definitely a seller's market at the deadline.

Does it really take that much hockey knowledge to realize that this team's offence gets pretty shallow after Datsyuk and Zetterberg? Or that Andreas Lilja in your top four isn't a great idea?

Why not? They're starting to get healthy and they've added Peter Forsberg. EDIT--- And apparently they've added Foote too.

Totally agree. In the very limited ice-time Stafford had, he looked pretty decent. And Quincey showed he has an edge to his game, which is something I didn't see a lot of when he played in the post-season for us. Despite being on the ice for every goal tonight, I honestly think Ericsson looked pretty good too. He got some decent chances pinching in from the blueline.