from Kevin Allen of Detroit Hockey Now,
The Detroit Red Wings’ hope to make the NHL playoffs for the first time in seven years is up in the air in more ways than one.
If they do make the postseason, they will likely say the turning point was going 4-1 on a wacky road trip that covered more than 6,000 miles in multiple time zones over eight days.
“I don’t know if I’ve experienced one quite like this, the time zones we hit, to go West, come back to the Mountain Zone, back out West, come all the way East,” Detroit coach Derek Lalonde said. “Ton of credit to our guys. This should instill some confidence, but it doesn’t get any easier, we got the Rangers coming in on Thursday.”...
Seven teams are in the hunt for a playoff spot, and the Red Wings are performing at a higher level than each of those teams. Detroit is 6-1 in its last seven, while the Islanders are 2-2-2 in their last six and Florida is 3-3. The Pittsburgh Penguins are 1-4 in their last five games. Washington is in a five-game losing streak.
“If you’re going to go on a run like this, keep stringing wins together like this, you got to get some balanced scoring and we got that,” Lalonde said. “I just love our commitment to the defensive side of the game.”
Vrana assigned to GR again after one game. May be a paper transaction temporarily. Figuring out the availability of Raymond, Zadina etc.
Detroit actually has the second best winning percentage of the wild card teams right now, just behind Pittsburgh. It is razor thin however and just one game here or there by several teams will move them around. Still, it’s better than I thought before the road trip that they would be this late in February.
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EDIT: While I used to estimate 95 points as minimum consideration for playoff cutoff, Pittsburgh’s current pct as the #1 WC would put them at 92 points. Isle would come in at 90 and Detroit 91 for the 2d WC spot.
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This is too vague and distant to make that kind of prediction b/c teams who make the final playoff positions often go on a tear late in the season 95 may still be needed. Detroit may have already used up their win mojo on this road trip. Nonetheless they are right there with as good a chance as anyone right now.
Someone wrote that Detroit has the toughest schedule remaining, which I do not doubt given that the three best teams in the East, and by a wide margin, are in their Division and probably constitute quite a few of their remaining games.
Boston, Toronto and TB playing .813, .672, .670.
TBL & BOS twice, TOR once, plus CAR twice, DAL, SEA & COL
Feels good to have that momentum that we MIGHT finally make it to the playoffs. Been awhile, man. Been awhile.
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