Dekeyser okay for Friday; Andersson heads back to Griffins

The Detroit Red Wings will breathe a sigh of relief this afternoon, as it appears that Danny DeKeyser, who had a scare in the third period of last night’s game, won’t miss any time as a result.

Dekeyser suffered the injury after getting in the way of a point shot from Senators defenceman Dion Phaneuf. Expectations shouldn’t be too high on Dekeyser to be at 100% on Friday. While his ailment isn’t enough to keep him out of the lineup, a bruised knee will still cause discomfort and limit his mobility a bit. Hopefully, though, that won’t last for very long.

As well, the Red Wings announced today that they were sending Joakim Andersson back to the Grand Rapids Griffins. Andersson was waived by the team on January 22nd and called back up before he had a chance to play his first AHL game in three seasons. The Swedish forward only played two games after the All-Star break before becoming a healthy scratch once again.

Sending Andersson back down now is a wise decision. For one, Andreas Athanasiou is playing above expectation; the 21-year-old call up snapped an extended, muti-league cold streak with two assists in three games and has looked like he belongs. On the other side of things, every day that Andersson is up with the Wings brings him closer to having to go back on waivers; a cleared player becomes waiver-eligible once again after 30 days or 10 NHL games played.

Dekeyser and the Red Wings will take on the Colorado Avalanche tomorrow at 7:30 PM, while Andersson could join the Griffins as early as tomorrow when they take on the Iowa Wild at 8:00 PM.