Wings Postgame: Trouble in Toronto
5 years ago
Well, that was a hard way to break the preseason winning streak. This will most likely be the type of games this season – where the opposition actually cares about winning the game.
The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Detroit Red Wings 6-2 on Friday night, the penultimate preseason game for both teams. Some good but mostly bad from the Red Wings tonight, it was a tough one.
Worth Mentioning…
- The Leafs came out firing in this one, Nazem Kadri scored within the first couple minutes to give them the lead almost immediately.
- Nyquist fired back before the first period was finished, from a nice pass from Dennis Cholowski.
- Cholowski had yet another impressive showing this preseason game. A few bad giveaways, but he had two assists and played just under 20 minutes – almost four minutes on the penalty kill alone.
- The icetime was pretty evenly divided between all six defenceman this game. Only Filip Hronek had less than fifteen total minutes. This is mostly because the Wings spent so much time on the penalty kill.
- The Red Wings almost evened out the shot numbers by the third period, but I’m just assuming that since the Leafs were already up 5-1, they weren’t really trying to get those shots anyways.
- Zadina more or less disappeared throughout this game. Small flashes of his skill, but overall these preseason games have shown us that he needs some more developing in the lower leagues before he makes his NHL debut. He had two shots on goal tonight.
Final Thoughts
The Red Wings were simply outclassed tonight. Even though it’s the preseason, the Leafs brought out all their big guns tonight and it was a real test for all of the Wings’ younger players. The top three time-on-ice leaders for the Wings tonight have barely seen an NHL game at all.
It was overall a rough game for even the veterans on the Wings tonight. Hopefully, it isn’t what all of the next nine months are going to look like for this team, but it’s hard not to be pessimistic after a game like that.
The Red Wings play their final preseason game against the same (hopefully weaker) Leafs tomorrow night at the Little Caesar’s Arena. Puck drop is at 7:00 p.m. You will be able to catch it on Sportsnet or Fox Sports Detroit.
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