from Ted Kulfan of the Detroit News,

Spend a few minutes with Justin Abdelkader and you sense he is approaching this season with urgency.

It’s understandable, given the way the NHL is these days.

Abdelkader is 32 and entering his 11th season, which in today’s NHL can be dinosaur territory.

Abdelkader is also coming off a season in which he scored a career-low six goals, and equaled a career-low with 19 points.

There is an urgency to rebound, to show he is still an effective NHL player.

“It was frustrating, just frustrating for sure,” Abdelkader said Tuesday after completing the second day of the Spartan Pro Camp at Munn Ice Arena. “In this league there are nights you can go out and feel good about how you played and you’ve had (offensive) chances, but if you’re not contributing offensively and you don’t have those points and continue to look and have zeroes on the scorecard that build up … your confidence can take a hit.”

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