from Mike Harrington of the Buffalo News,

If you're the rookie GM of the 31st-place club trying to look good in front of ownership, it's probably a pretty easy sell that you're going to build your team around Rasmus Dahlin, Dylan Cozens, Casey Mittelstadt, Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen, Jack Quinn, Mattias Samuelsson, Arttu Ruotsalainen, a re-signed Ullmark and whoever you draft in the top three in July.

As bad a day as Monday felt like, go read the previous paragraph again. It makes things look less dark. And that's before you add whatever players or picks they might get in any deals for Eichel, Reinhart or Ristolainen.

Maybe that's what they should do. The veterans didn't seem to go out of their way to throw any olive branches on Monday to Don Granato. Frankly, it doesn't look like they give a damn who the coach of this team is going forward. It's not like they perform for anybody who's been behind the bench here at all in recent years, their odd love for Ralph Krueger notwithstanding.

Remember, this franchise has won exactly nothing with those three guys. It hasn't played a single playoff game with a No. 8 pick in 2013 and guys taken No. 2 the two following years. Nobody can argue this trio hasn't given a lot over nearly 1,400 combined NHL games between the three of them. It hasn't meant a thing.

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So to start to evaluate where Eichel could be traded, we asked The Athletic’s NHL staff to evaluate their team’s level of interest in Eichel and what they could offer in a package.

Detroit Red Wings: The Red Wings have the cap space, draft capital and farm system to put together a highly competitive offer for Eichel, who is a high-end No. 1 NHL center with elite scoring. That’s the kind of piece the Red Wings sorely need, and he fits their age range. But the cost to acquire him would be high, perhaps prohibitively so. The Sabres could reasonably ask for top defense prospect Moritz Seider, plus a high-lineup current NHLer and Detroit’s top 10 pick, at which point the Red Wings wouldn’t be much closer to contending than they are today. And Eichel wouldn’t likely be any happier, either. Yzerman should do his due diligence, but it’s not a great fit between two rebuilding teams. -Max Bultman

more (paid) teams...

from Helene St. James of the Detroit Free Press,

What “very quickly" means to one person is not necessarily reflected in another person’s meaning.

The Detroit Red Wings’ season has been over since an overtime loss Saturday night in Columbus, and general manager Steve Yzerman still hasn’t shown his hand regarding Jeff Blashill’s coaching future. Last month, Yzerman said he’d sit down with Blashill “very quickly” after the season ended, but it has been two days and counting since the final horn.

Yzerman’s comments April 12 indicated he already knew what he was going to do: Extend Blashill’s contract, inform him his time with the organization is over — or perhaps tell Blashill there’ll be a new coach coming in, and offer him a different position, such as scouting.

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from Bill Dow at the Detroit Free Press,

As part of his series on former Detroit sports figures, Bill Dow caught up with former Detroit Red Wings coach and hockey legend Scotty Bowman....

Bowman on coaching players:

“When you go to a new team, it takes a while to get to know everybody. Some players, you cater to more than others. Some players have to be pushed and prodded and some you have to be quiet with. Some players you can’t get on them or they’ll pack it up.

"I never tried to sugar coat it with the players and I think they wanted you to be honest with them. You have to tell them what is truthful and what is not. But when it’s all said and done, to get the most out of the good players they needed someone to be pushing them and that’s how they got into the NHL.”

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THREE HARD LAPS

* Some matchups and seeds are still to be determined, but the field is set for the 2021 Stanley Cup Playoffs as the Canadiens clinched the 16th and final berth on Monday.

* Both matchups in the MassMutual East Division First Round were confirmed – the Panthers also clinched the No. 2 seed in the Discover Central Division.

* Tonight’s two-game slate features the Capitals and Bruins contesting their season finale before meeting in the 2021 First Round, while the Jets look to earn one point and clinch the No. 3 seed in the Scotia North Division.