Time: 6:00pm ET
Place: Little Caesars Arena – Detroit, MI
TV: BSDET, ATTSN-RM
Radio: 97.1 FM The Ticket
Golden Knights Blog: Knights On Ice
Preview
For the first time in November 2021 there will be NHL hockey played in Michigan. After four straight games and seven of their last eight on the road, the Red Wings return to the Dough Joe tonight to take on the Vegas Golden Knights. Both teams come in on the back end of a back to back, with the Red Wings playing their third game in four days. It was kind of a dull game for most of the time last night, but man the last ten minutes plus overtime made up for it. Tyler Bertuzzi with another two goals and two helpers, Lucas Raymond with another three assists, and of course Mortiz Seider scoring his first NHL goal to win it in overtime for the boys in red.
Vegas comes in having won five of their last six games after a bit of a slow start, incluiding last night in Montreal 5-2. Of course they will be slightly shorthanded down the middle after the Jack Eichel trade saw Alex Tuch and Peyton Krebs heading to Buffalo and Jack Eichel out for awhile after finally being able to get surgery on his neck. Vegas will also be without captain Mark Stone, Max Pacioretty, and Nolan Patrick who join Eichel on a very crowded (and expensive) LTIR. There is still some depth to Vegas up front with the likes of Chandler Stephenson (4G, 6A), Jonathan Marchessault (4G, 2A), Rielly Smith (2G, 3A), and Evgeny Dadonov (2G, 2A) but they definitely are missing their top end talent. The same is not true on the back end however, with Alex Pietrangelo, Alec Martinez, Shea Theodore, Nicolas Hague, and Brayden McNabb shoring up a relatively solid blue line for the Golden Knights. In net, it will likely be Laurent Brossoit going tonight for Vegas as Robin Lehner tended the net last night.
For Detroit, expect a lot of the same. They looked better last night against Buffalo than they had since they were in Toronto the night before Halloween, at least in the third period and in overtime anyways. The team has struggled a bit since Dylan Larkin has been out of the lineup and they will likely be without him again tonight since, as far as we know, he is still away dealing with whatever personal issue(s) he is dealing with right now. The story for the Red Wings on the ice continues to be the play of their two talented rookies, Lucas Raymond and Mortiz Seider. Both are still one and two atop the league rookie scoring race and are slowly climbing up the assist ladder for the entire NHL. Raymond continues to find ways to impact the game and get points as he added another three assists in last night’s win in Buffalo.. Seider has looked solid on even strength despite still pairing with Danny DeKeyser, but he is still struggling a bit on the penalty kill as of late (as has the entire team). Tomas Greiss will likely get the net to start tonight with Alex Nedeljkovic starting last night in Buffalo. Greiss has been better than his numbers show this season, making several big saves but being hung out by the team in front him on more than a couple occasions (especially on the penalty kill).
This is a bit of a watershed game for Detroit. They have struggled for more than a few games now since their strong start and it will be important for them to come out strong out of the gate tonight against a Vegas team that is scuffling a little themselves to start the season but has a lot of experience and high expectations for this season.
