Abel to Yzerman

Abel to Yzerman

Started Humming A Song from 2003

04/18/2015 at 2:00pm EDT

12 years and 8 days ago the Red Wings, opening their defense of the Stanley Cup, put up 64 shots on Jean-Sebastian Giguere. 1 got by him. His coach at the time is, ironically, sure to be courted soon by that very lone goal scorer, Brendan Shanahan.

The Wings outshot Anaheim by 20 that night, by 13 the next, by 11 in Game 3 and 7 in Game 4. Detroit owned a 51-shot advantage and got swept by a Mike Babcock coached team.

Let's not get too crazy. Babcock, to my knowledge, didn't go all Emilio and create a daring game plan that stunned the hockey world and all 19 of us. He simply put a guy in net who could not be beaten. If I remember correctly, though, the Wings had a lot of shots from very pedestrian places on the ice. I seem to recall many, many perimeter attempts right into Giguere's chest.

A very hot goalie and a good team can beat a very good team and a warm, nervous goalie. And they can do it quickly. We have painful experience that attests to that.

Game 1 is just that, and we've been here before. The odds are still steep.

But Babcock's pushing buttons again. He made the Mrazek decision for reasons we trust, but will probably never fully know or understand.

That decision got him one win, but the shot disparity--and who authored in '03 and again Thursday-- is too rich of a coincidence to ignore.

Uncle Mike has something brewing, which means we have at least 4 more games of disgusting torture left. And that's 1 more than a few smart guys thought we'd have.

Somebody's cocky and that's Mrazek. Somebody's feeling big-time heat and that's Bishop.

And someone else is most likely absolutely wasted right now, and that's Larry Murphy.

15 to 12.

It's a live blog, bitches.

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About Abel to Yzerman

Welcome to Abel to Yzerman, a Red Wing blog since 1977. No other site on the internet has better-researched, fact-laden and better prepared discussions than A2Y. Re-phrase: we do little research, find facts and stats highly overrated and claim little to no preparation. There are 19 readers of A2Y. No more, no less. All of them, except maybe one, are juvenile in nature. Reminding them of that in the comment section will only encourage them to prove that.

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