Red Wings vs Capitals: GDU, Lineups, Keys to the Game

Joshua Pickering

• 2 min read Front Page

Game Day Updates

Lineups

Detroit

Forwards
Perron - Larkin - Raymond
Soderblom - Copp - Erne
Zadina - Rasmussen - Kubalik
Suter - Veleno - Luff

Defense
Chiarot - Seider
Maatta - Hronek
Hagg - Lindstrom

Goalies
Husso
Nedeljkovic

Washington

Forwards
Ovechkin - Kuznetsov - Mantha
Johansson - Strome - Sheary
Snively - Eller - Protas
Milano - Dowd - Hathaway
Defense
Orlov - Van Riemsdyk
Fehervary - Jensen
Gustafsson - Irwin
Goalies
Kuemper
Lindgren

Keys to the Game

1.  Bring On the Nostalgia

The Wings are celebrating the 25 year anniversary of the 1997 and 1998 Stanley Cup teams tonight and Saturday. After some difficult seasons the past few years and a rough week, a reminder of the glory days will be a welcome sight for Wings fans. A lot of the players on this Wings team won’t be old enough to have any memories of those years, but the hope is that it gives the fans a boost which in turn will give a boost to the club. It doesn’t hurt to have the Stanley Cup in the building either to bring some motivation to a November regular season game.

2.  Bring Back the Penalty Kill

No that doesn’t mean parading to the box to get some shorthanded work in. But what is concerning is that after the perfect start to the season for the penalty kill, it has crashed back to earth settling in at 80%, middle of the league. Washington’s powerplay hasn’t lit the league on fire so far this season, but any powerplay featuring Alex Ovechkin can be very dangerous if given the chance to get set up. After some ugly outings over the last week, including on special teams, Detroit needs to keep the Washington powerplay from being a factor in this game.

3. Clean It Up Defensively

Detroit’s injuries have all been up front, not having a single defensive player miss a game due to injury so far. Yet they have been leaky defensively. Detroit is 17th in scoring but 24th in scoring against. The inflated losses last week are a large factor in that. But defensive lapses were being covered up earlier due to strong goaltending to start the season. They give up over 35 shots a game on average, sitting 28th in the league in that department. That is simply not good enough. While they give up a lot of shots they are slightly better in the quality of shots they give up as they are 22nd in expected goals against per 60 at 2.77. Regardless, neither number is great and it’s an area they’ll need to clean up as the season goes on.