The Fifth Liners

This week it was out with the old and in with the new this week in the state of Springsteen as New Jersey Devils sacked head coach Peter DeBoer and swiftly replaced with him former Capitals coach Adam Oates and former captain Scott Stevens . A storm of controversy soon followed as the Caps protested that NJ should have asked permission first, but the matter was quickly settled with the minimum of fuss. After leading the Devils to an unlikely Stanley Cup final appearence in 2012, DeBoer has struggled to bring consistency to his aging side and has left his side seventh overall in the Eastern Conference and over nine points adrift from the wild card slot! In his four years as coach, De Boer only registered a solitary playoff appearance. But his sacking doesn't appear to be been solely based on results. Since the departure of stars Zach Parise and Ilya Kovalchuk , New Jersey has failed to replacement them with a consistent goal scorer. This season in particular has been a pretty...

Jordin Tootoo has been placed on waivers to free up some cap space for the Detroit Red Wings. The rest of the NHL (and I suppose the world) now has to noon tomorrow to pick up Tootoo or he'll be assigned to the Red Wings' AHL affiliate; the Grand Rapids Griffins. If Tootoo is sent to the Griffins, this won't necessarily be a bad thing for the Canadian forward. He'll get games, which is more than he was as a Detroit healthy scratch. Also the Griffins just won the Calder Cup, and that's a team I'd like to play for.

With just three days to go before the Red Wings take to the ice for the first time this season, the team has added the following players to its injury reserve list. Darren Helm Patrick Eaves Jonas Gustavsson Jordin Tootoo Helm and Eaves are on the long term IR, which means that they'll miss a minimum of 10 games. Tootoo and Gustavsson are on the seven day IR. They can expect to miss the first three games of the season. Thanks to the Red Wings' Facebook page for the update.

The Detroit Red Wings are determined not to miss out on that last playoff place in the Western Conference. Last night the LA Kings were welcomed to the Joe Louis Arena (minus Dustin Brown). The Kings opened the scoring in the second period Kyle Clifford wristed past Jimmy Howard . Pavel Datsyuk responded with a backhanded effort five minutes later to restore parity. In the third period, Jordin Tootoo gave the Wings the edge and Valtteri Filppula sealed both points. The win puts the Wings a point ahead of Columbus and edges the team back into the playoff places. Columbus, Dallas and Detroit are all still in the competition to see who'll get knocked out by Chicago in the playoffs. Full story  here.