Morning Skate: Red Wings at Maple Leafs
Game 4
7:30p ET, Air Canada Centre
Toronto, ON
TV: Fox Sports Detroit
Radio: 97.1 The Ticket
Leafs Blogs: Pension Plan Puppets
Leave your toasters and fancy stats loving friends at home because the Wings are about to invade Toronto. The Wings lost in a shoot out to the Bawston Brooooooins on Wednesday night, despite Jimmy Howard pulling out his jimmy and beating the entire Bruins team with it and Mike Babcock is still pissed at himself for not putting Gustav Nyquist on the ice for the power play in OT. Let's not do any of that again, eh? The Leafs have been off since Tuesday night when they beat the Colorado Crapalanche 3-2 in OT. We may see some necessary shuffling of D pairings tonight and Justin Abdelkader may or may not be injured and if he's out, we should see Stephen Weiss make his season debut.
There's always something a little extra satisfying about beating the Leafs for me. Maybe it's because they do so many stupid things, maybe it's because watching their fans and media set themselves on fire and run through the streets it infinitely entertaining, or maybe it's because they picked Dick Panik up off waivers from Tampa and I will always freaking hate that fartmuncher who has singlehandedly concussed Adam Almqvist, dirty charged Tomas Jurco, got Nyquist kicked out of a key playoff game in the Calder Cup Finals for "spearing", and is generally a dick to everyone. No I don't hold a grudge, why do you ask?
I'd like the Wings to win this game, and maybe some of the big names can score some goals.
The Expected Lineups
Forwards
| Gustav Nyquist | Henrik Zetterberg | Johan Franzen |
| Tomas Tatar | Riley Sheahan | Tomas Jurco |
| Justin Abdelkader | Darren Helm | Andrej Nestrasil |
| Joakim Andersson | Luke Glendening | Drew Miller |
Defensemen
| Niklas Kronwall | Brendan Smith |
| Jonathan Ericsson | Jakub Kindl |
| Kyle Quincey | Danny DeKeyser |
Goaltenders
| Jimmy Howard (starting) |
| Jonas Gustavsson |
Scratches: Daniel Cleary, Stephen Weiss & Brian Lashoff
Injuries: Pavel Datsyuk (shoulder)
Forwards
| James van Riemsdyk | Tyler Bozak | Phil Kessel |
| Brandon Kozun | Nazem Kadri | Daniel Winnik |
| Carter Ashton | Peter Holland | Matt Frattin / Richard Panik |
| Leo Komarov | Mike Santorelli | David Clarkson |
Defensemen
| Dion Phaneuf | Stephane Robidas |
| Morgan Rielly | Cody Franson |
| Stuart Percy | Roman Polak |
Goaltenders
| Jonathan Bernier (starting) |
| James Reimer |
Bullets of Knowledge
- The Red Wings are 278-273-93-4 (W-L-T-OTL) all-time in the regular season against the Leafs.
- On October 5, 1991 Nicklas Lidstrom recorded his first NHL point, an assist, against the Maple Leafs at Maple Leaf Gardens.
- On October 15, 1993 Chris Osgood made his NHL debut in a loss against the Leafs. He looked only 5 years younger than he does today.
- Howard is 2-1-1 with a 2.49 GAA and .901 SV% in 5 career regular season starts against Toronto./
- Jonas Gustavsson still has nightmares about being a Leaf, but as you can see he gets happier every year he's not in Toronto.