The Fifth Liners

This week Vancouver Canucks winger Alex Burrows received a three game ban for this hit on Montreal Canadiens winger Alexei Emelin  But it appears that after the Canucks 3-2 win over the Edmonton Oilers at Rexall Place last night (thanks Derek Dorrsett!) it seems that Oilers captain Andrew Ference will be hearing the phone ringing from the League quite soon in the coming days after his frankly awful hit on Canucks player Zack Kassian ! See below... Now when you consider that Burrows got a three game ban for his offense, should the league be tougher on Ference who is a previous offender? Burrows' hit was admittedly a careless one as he went in late and this type of extremely hard contact could have resulted in some serious damage to Emelin. Receiving a three game suspension though seemed slightly rash by league standards as we have seen more serious hits only receiving a one game ban. But Ference however, had been scrapping with Kassian all through the match and his inte...

Today the Olympic Ice Hockey rosters for the upcoming Sochi 2014 games have been officially confirmed, after much speculation surrounding them there has been some interesting selections made and no doubt this will spark furious debate among hockey fans, let's take a look at the main contenders. Canada  The 25 man Canadian squad certainly isn't lacking in depth, and this year they will be the team to beat and 11 of 2010 Gold Medal team will make a return journey! The defensive selection is one I highly commend as they have mixed youth of players like PK Subban along with defensive quality like Jay Bouwmeester. The St Louis pairing of JB along with Pietrangelo could well be a wise selection! Offensively the star count is ridiculously high with Crosby, Toews, Perry, Stamkos and Kunitz among others being featured and Canada will rely on this goal power to see them through! There are few surprise selections with Marc-Andre Fleury missing out in favour of Roberto Luongo and the ...

Boston have been playing well of late, quietly getting on with job. The result of which is a spot at the top of the Eastern Conference. Detroit's troubles this season have been well documented and last night the team had to go without superstar Pavel Datsyuk and dependable first-liner Todd Bertuzzi. On paper, this looked like another win for Boston. The first ten minutes were close, the Bruins looked dangerous when pushing and the Red Wings broke well, recently returned Darren Helm almost opened the scoring with a lightning fast breakaway, only to put the puck wide. Detroit's Johan Franzen then stepped up. The Mule set up the first and only goal of a penalty packed first period when his cross through the blue paint found Justin Abdelkader who tapped in the opener. This came straight after he stepped out of the penalty box after picking up a penalty for high-sticking on Zdeno Mt. Chara. Must have been a really high stick. The second period brought more goals for boys in ...

Musings, observations and general stuff.  Daniel Alfredsson seems to have found his happy place, the veteran forward picked up his first Detroit goal this week and has also grabbed plenty of assists. Alfredsson has nine points so far. Only Datsyuk and Zetterberg have more. Niklas Kronwall's concussion is a real concern. Widely regarded as the cornerstone of the Red Wings' PK unit, it's hard to tell who will step up if he doesn't return soon. Detroit's blueliners haven't been spectacular recently but backup goalie Jonas Gustavsson is playing out of his skin. Last season may have been forgettable for Gustavsson but so far he's .922 for the season. Jimmy Howard is expected back for tonight's game against Phoenix. The goalie has been sat out since bruising his hand in the warm up against Boston.  Darren Helm is expected to be back soon, which is probably bad news for Luke Glendening who was brought up from the Calder Cup winning Grand Ra...

At the start of the fifth game of the season, the Detroit Red Wings were 2/4 and hadn't scored a single powerplay goal. Sure they'd done pretty well on the penalty kill, fending off some serious five on three attacks, but after ten attempts, had not been able to take man advantage and grab some goals. That changed last night when the Red Wings welcomed the Struggling Philadelphia Flyers to the Joe Louis Arena.  Detroit didn't take long to open the scoring when Todd Bertuzzi , promoted to the first line, scored a great wrap-around after Michael Raffl went to the box for hooking. Raffl had been called up to deal with the Flyers' injury woes. The second period brought more goals and more penalties. Luke Schenn 's trip to the box allowed Niklas Kronwall the chance to remind us he's not just there to flatten the opposition. The big Swede opened his scoring account for the season.  Erik Gustafsson immediately decided to emulate his fellow countryman ...

Advantage Chicago Blackhawks . The Detroit Red Wings made their first trip to the United Center last night for the first game of the second round. Damien Brunner 's first period goal cancelled out Marian Hossa 's opener and that's how it stayed until eight minutes into the third period when Johnny Oduya and Marcus Kruger scored in quick succession to give the Blackhawks the lead. Patrick Sharp added a fourth with less than a minute to go. Final score 4-1. Nicklas Kronwall was unimpressed with his team's performance: " We know we're a much better team than this. [The] second and third periods [were] not nearly good enough. We know we're better than this and we have to find a way to get better for Game 2." - Geico's quote of the day. It wasn't all plain sailing for Chicago and a few desperate goal line scrambles and clearances were required to keep Detroit out. The boys from Michigan will rue the missed chances and opportunities. C...

Playoffs without the Detroit Red Wings are like picnics without sandwiches or Coach Maclean without his 'tache. It just doesn't happen. It hasn't happened for over 20 years either. The Wings are currently sat seventh in the Western Conference and came very close to dropping to 8th. Two things in Detroit's favour are that their next game is against eighth placed St Louis at the Joe Louis. In addition to this, Mike Babcock's team have a 4 point cushion over the teams outside the conference top 8. At this late stage of the season, that small cushion could have a huge impact. Detroit's second road game in as many days was against bottom-of-the-conference Colorado at the Pepsi Center. Mark Olver cancelled out Pavel Datsyuk's opener before Gustav Nyquist gave the Wings the edge again with the first period ending 2-1. That's how the score stayed until 6 minutes into the third when P.A. Parenteau deflected the puck past Jimmy Howard to draw the Avs equa...

In Detroit Red Wings 3-2 away win over Colorago Avalanche last night, Avs player Jamie McGinn found out just what it means 'Being Kronwalled'  by Wings defenseman Niklas Kronwall right at the end of regulation time! The Swede is a man who knows the very definition of hard hitting and unless you like waking up with some very painful marks- it is advised to steer clear of him on the ice! After his big hit on Minnesota's Charlie Coyle earlier in the season, it is clear that this man has many bone breaking hits in him yet Check out McGinn receiving an education here http://video.nhl.com/videocenter/console?catid=72&id=236431&navid=nhl:topheads

Wall by name, wall by nature. The Swede welcomes Wild new boy Charlie Coyle to the big league. Unsurprisingly he picked up a double minor for this.