Game One Recap (Red Wings 4, Penguins 0)

So now we know how it feels. Here's a partial list of great offensive players who were nearly invisible during the first three rounds the Penguins played: Dany Heatley, Jason Spezza, Daniel Alfredsson, Scott Gomez, Brendan Shanahan, Chris Drury, Daniel Briere. About $50 million of goal-scoring on an annual basis, but completely inconsequential against the Penguins this year. But I can't remember anything of significance done by Marian Hossa, Petr Sykora or Evgeni Malkin in last night's game. Well, other than Malkin mishandling Fleury's clearing attempt and setting the table for Detroit's second goal which effectively ended the game. Two-goal leads held by that Red Wings team just aren't going to be overcome by anybody.

The game really didn't start out too bad. Although the Penguins failed to score on those four plower plays in the first period, the play was even. When Detroit came out for the second period, however, it looked every bit like they'd become convinced that they'd withstood the worst of the Penguins' offensive firepower, and they started in with playing their game. The Penguins obliged by making bad passes and failing to clear out the defensive zone. It was a little hard not to be disappointed with the softness of the Wings' first goal-- I'm guessing everyone at Joe Louis Arena other than Marc-Andre Fleury and everybody watching on television could see that Samuelsson was going for the wraparound-- but Fleury'd kept the Penguins in the game to that point, and it wasn't his fault that they'd been unable to do anything in the previous thirty minutes of play.

Therrien wasted no time in announcing new lines for Game Two. Getting Roberts into the lineup was a given, and if his impact is anywhere near his contribution in Game One of the Senators' series, then the Penguins will earn a split in Detroit. I like the other moves as well. Something needs to be done to jolt Malkin back to playing his game. At this point, he's avoiding contact whenever he can and largely staying out of the slot and around the perimeter. The Wings have something to do with that, but Malkin has to fight through it. It might look a little like Therrien's pushing the panic button a little too quickly, but if they drop the second game, he's still got time to make another move or two when the series heads back home.