In what was a fun game to watch, the Red Wings lost again to the Minnesota Wild, 6-5 in a shootout.
The Wings once held a 4-2 lead in this game, and their ability to protect leads is clearly non-existent. Lucas Raymond and Jakub Vrana both had two goals. Nick Leddy had the playmaker with 3 assists, and Joe Veleno added two of his own. Offensively is was a solid night. Nick Leddy looked particularly impressive on his assists, with a beautiful spin move on Ryan Hartman to set up Lucas Ramond's first goal on the night.
Alex Nedeljkovic looked much better, and was clearly the better goalie in this one. That's not saying much though. The Wild goaltending has been relatively atrocious this season, and for a team with aspirations for contention in the postseason, if they don't find a goalie before the trade deadline, they could be in real trouble. Unless Cam Talbot of Kaapo Kahkonen go on a serious run, neither is currently capable of backstopping a team to the Cup.
Back to the Wings, the defense hasn't been there the past few weeks. I mean, it hasn't been there most of the season, but it's been worse recently. A third straight game surrendering five-plus goals, is clearly an issue. After his minus-six performance against Arizona, Gustav Lindstrom sat this one out, but he was far from the only issue in that game. Jordan Oesterle and Nick Leddy were both minus-four against the Coyotes, and both bounced back in some regard in this game. Leddy with the aforementioned playmaker, and Oesterle with the game-tying goal with just under three minutes remaining against the Wild to send it to overtime. Troy Stecher pulled into the lineup in Lindstrom's place, and was minus-one. At some point, I would expect Olli Juolevi to see game action, and I expected him to pull into the lineup in Oesterle's place against the Wild, but with bounce-back efforts from Leddy and Oesterle it's increasingly unclear when Juolevi will make his debut in the winged wheel.
The line of Veleno, Vrana, and Zadina was making noise every time on the ice. Filip Zadina made a really good inside-out play on Matt Dumba to get behind the Wild net, where he eventually found Oesterle for the tying goal. Zadina got hammered at the Arizona blue line late in the game Tuesday when he was trying to carry the puck deep. I thought at the time, that he may never be that kind of "inside" player. This was a perimeter play, but a darn good one. Zadina strikes me two different ways offensively. One, he can't carry the puck through traffic. That's ok, very few players can. But when he gets the puck in traffic, he has a phenomenal shot, and he's clearly had some bad puck luck there this year. On this play however, he showcases the other side of his offensive ability, where he can make a move on the perimeter, and look for an open teammate. I do think there's something to the statement that he's more of a perimeter guy, but I still think there's more to his game when he gets the puck on his stick in the slot. That shot is just far too good.
While the VVZ line was good, there were a few names that I didn't really notice. Captain Dylan Larkin and linemate Tyler Bertuzzi were held pointless on the night, a rarity when this team scores five goals.
Robby Fabbri was also quiet before leaving injured in the second period. The team believes he has a torn ACL, which would end his season. Word is, this is NOT the same knee in which he had previously torn his ACL.
Overall, the defense needs to be better. It will be interesting to see how they cope with the loss of Fabbri. The team has no real scoring options in Grand Rapids, aside from Jonatan Berggren, and it would be mildly surprising to see him brought up before he is truly dominating at that level, as the team has said in the past. Coupled with the impending trade deadline, which could see a small handful of guys leaving the club, the next couple weeks figures to be interesting.
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