Updates
Torts: Harrington and Nash are out of the lineup. Foligno draws back in with his suspension complete. Korpisalo in net. #CBJ
— Alison (@AlisonL) November 21, 2019
NEWS: #CBJ announce that veteran NHL coach and player Paul MacLean has joined the club as an assistant coach/special teams.
RELEASE: https://t.co/SXxoiOt4o0
— CBJ Public Relations (@BlueJacketsPR) November 21, 2019
Torts says MacLean will be behind the bench in games – so now four coaches back there.
Focus will be primarily the power play #CBJ
— Alison (@AlisonL) November 21, 2019
Among those skating this morning is #RedWings Helm, who left Tuesday’s game with a lower-body injury.
— Dana Wakiji (@Dwakiji) November 21, 2019
#RedWings Helm said he feels good now, has to see if that lasts through warmups before they decide if he can play.
— Dana Wakiji (@Dwakiji) November 21, 2019
#RedWings Blashill said Green and Nemeth definitely out for tonight.
— Dana Wakiji (@Dwakiji) November 21, 2019
#RedWings Howard was first off the ice. #CBJ
— Dana Wakiji (@Dwakiji) November 21, 2019
Lineups
[Editor’s note – lines/pairings are a best-guess with the optional skate. Glendening didn’t practice yesterday, so it’s possible he would be out and the team would instead go 11/7 with Biega coming in as the extra defender]
DETROIT
Tyler Bertuzzi – Dylan Larkin – Anthony Mantha
Andreas Athanasiou – Valtteri Filppula – Robby Fabbri
Taro Hirose – Frans Nielsen – Brendan Perlini
Christoffer Ehn – Luke Glendening – Adam Erne
Filip Hronek – Madison Bowey
Dennis Cholowski – Jonathan Ericsson
Joe Hicketts – Dylan McIlrath
Jimmy Howard
Jonathan Bernier
COLUMBUS
Sonny Milano – Pierre-Luc Dubois – Emil Bemstrom
Alexandre Texier – Nick Foligno – Cam Atkinson
Gustav Nyquist – Boone Jenner – Oliver Bjorkstrand
Eric Robinson – Alexander Wennberg – Josh Anderson
Zach Werenski – Seth Jones
Ryan Murray – David Savard
Vladislav Gavrikov – Dean Kukan
Joonas Korpisalo
Elvis Merzlikins
Keys to the Game
Play 60
When the Red Wings play a full or even near full game they can play with most teams in the league. The problem is, if they take any time off they drop of very quickly and usually find themselves in a hole. This is indicative of a team that has talent but is not really that deep. Columbus is not super deep in talent either so this is a winnable game for the Wings if they can bring the effort.
Special Teams
This is going to be a NERF battle between a team with a weak (but potentially still dangerous) power play and awful (but improving) penalty kill and a team with a weak (but potentially still dangerous) power play and a not that good, just not awful, penalty kill.
Secondary Scoring
We all know about the Reed Wings top line. Today’s Morning Skate laid out that Columbus has a few dangerous offensive players as well. They are also a fairly competent defensive team with a solid blue line so they can afford to only have a few offensive players going…the Red Wings not so much. They are still a work in progress defensively (outside of some quality by the Larkin line) so they need their secondary scoring to win games. It is not really a coincidence that the addition of Robby Fabbri to the roster, as well as putting him on a line with Val Filppula and Andreas Athanasiou coincides with the Red Wings point recently snapped five game point streak. They have to keep it going to keep some of the pressure off the Larkin line and make this team more difficult to shut down offensively.
