Red Wings pre-season game day: Blashill’s crew takes on Pittsburgh

Fresh off a 5-1 beatdown of the Columbus Blue Jackets, the Detroit Red Wings will have little time Sunday to rest on their laurels.

The Wings will head east for an afternoon contest against the Pittsburgh Penguins at PPG Paints Arena at 12:00 p.m. ET. While this rematch of the 2008 and 2009 Stanley Cup Final series will surely carry less weight in the hockey world, it should still answer some lingering questions about Detroit’s training camp roster.

You’ll be able to listen to the game on WXVT-FM 97.1 The Ticket in Detroit.

Barring any Sunday morning cuts, the Red Wings still have 54 players in camp:

Forwards (30): Filip Zadina, Robby Fabbri, Jakub Vrána (inj.), Mitchell Stephens, Lucas Raymond, Pius Suter, Taro Hirose, Riley Barber, Michael Rasmussen, Carter Rowney, Kyle Criscuolo, Chase Pearson, Givani Smith, Dominik Shine, Hayden Verbeek, Jonatan Berggren, Bobby Ryan, Turner Elson, Tyler Bertuzzi, T-Bone Codd, Jon Martin, Dennis Yan, Dylan Larkin, Adam Erne, Tyler Spezia, Patrick Curry, Kirill Tyutyayev, Sam Gagner, Joe Veleno, Vladislav Namestnikov

Defensemen (19): Nick Leddy, Jared McIsaac, Filip Hronek, Marc Staal, Luke Witkowski, Dan Renouf, Gustav Lindström, Brian Lashoff, Donovan Sebrango, Wyatt Newpower, Seth Barton, Moritz Seider, Danny DeKeyser, Troy Stecher, Jordan Oesterle, Mason Ward, Alex Cotton, Adam Brubacher, Ryan Murphy

Goaltenders (5): Thomas Greiss, Calvin Pickard, Victor Brattström, Kaden Fulcher, Alex Nedeljkovic

Detroit went with these lines for Saturday’s game against the Blue Jackets:

We’ll post their travelling roster for Sunday’s game as soon as it’s released.

Update — here it is:

Pittsburgh has released its lineup for Sunday’s game:

Forwards: Evan Rodrigues, Drew O’Connor, Brian Boyle, Jason Zucker, Bryan Rust, Sam Lafferty, Brock McGinn, Kasperi Kapanen, Danton Heinen, Teddy Blueger, Jake Guentzel, Jeff Carter

Defensemen: Chad Ruhwedel, Mike Matheson, John Marino, Brian Dumoulin, Juuso Riikola, Kris Letang

Goaltenders: Louis Domingue, Tristan Jarry

The Penguins trimmed their training camp roster by 13 players on Saturday, bringing the reduced total to 35.

It’s hard to guess who will appear for the Red Wings on Sunday but it’ll be interesting to see whether head coach Jeff Blashill gives Alex Nedeljkovic a chance to better Thomas Greiss’ 19-save performance on Saturday. Nedeljkovic’s only previous appearance in the pre-season came against Buffalo on Sept. 30; he made 17 saves on 19 shots in the 6-2 Red Wings victory.

Brian Boyle will appear for the Penguins on Sunday. The hulking 36-year-old centre sat out the entire 2020–21 season without a contract after spending the 2019–20 campaign largely as a reserve for the Florida Panthers. Boyle was memorably named to the 2018 NHL all-star game as an injury replacement for Taylor Hall; the 2017–18 season was Boyle’s first after he was diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia in Sept. 2017.