And with that, the season begins! (Wings 4 Leafs 0)

I ended up missing practice yesterday morning thanks to a technological failure, but I did make it to the Joe to see the Wings take on the Leafs in the last preseason game of the year. The game was a little lopsided, as the Wings were running most of their A team (including Datsyuk, Lidstrom, and Hasek in net), and the Leafs looked to be playing Antropov, Ponikarovsky, Toskala, and the 2007/2008 Toronto Marlies. The last two times I saw this matchup I showed up in a Leafs hoodie to show my support - and they lost both times. This time I wore my Wings jersey...and they not only one but Hasek even got a shutout. I'm not sure what this means, but I think I'm a curse on the Leafs.

Leafs starting lineup - no Sundin, no Tucker, no Blake.

The game itself was a decent tilt, even being preseason and fairly uneven. The Wings were held scoreless in the first, but followed up with two bouts of netting two in quick succession to eventually win 4-0. Some of my notes include:

• Vesa Toskala was in net for the Leafs. Having seen Raycroft twice last year, I was hoping he would be. He put up a great show in the first period, with two brilliant saves, and looked amazing on his glove side. At least two of the three goals he let in were stick side, where he was definitely weaker, but only one was a bad goal. He also had the thinnest goalie stick I have ever seen, and liked to wander around a little bit like that other Finnish goalie. I regret to inform Jordi, however, that I was unable to steal her for him.

• In the absence of Robert Lang, my rookie Jiri Hudler seems to have found a new friend in Dan Cleary. The two were paired up quite a bit last night and seemed to be able to find each other with an ease that reminded you of a toned down Datsyuk and Zetterberg, and the pair generated a number of great scoring chances which resulted in one goal and an insanely close follow-up. A pair to keep an eye on when the season starts, perhaps? Speaking of Hudler, while he still needs to work on speed, he looks a lot quicker and more evasive out there than last year, and he's still doing a great job getting off some seriously booming shots.
  

• Both Nicklas (Wings) and Staffan Kronvall (Leafs) were on the ice - neither did a whole lot, but it was fun seeing the brothers skating against each other. Staffan, for the record, is a giant, in that Smid sort of way where he really seems small until you realize he is most certainly not.

• Pavel Datsyuk, as almost always, had a great night - but what was almost more interesting was how well Johan Franzen looked playing with him. He was all over the ice, picked up a goal and an assist, and had several really nice plays to his name as well. They might not be the Eurotwins, but their line is going to be awfully dangerous.

• Dominik Hasek looked spectacular, though he didn't face very many shots. Still, after the showing he had in the earlier preseason game he took part in, it was a serious relief to see him so strong.

• Both fights near the end of the game happened directly in front of my seats - the second one right up against the glass (I hear via Bethany that I was on TV during the second). The first, Dan Cleary vs. Kris Newbury, was an awesome old-fashioned NHL fight - I was surprised how well Newbury stood up to the bigger Cleary, as well.
  

• The second fight turned into more of a all-encompassing scrum, but started directly after I saw Igor Grigorenko lounging around on the ice doing little to nothing and yelled "Freakin' DO something Grigorenko!" His answer was to lazily cheap shot Jay Harrison in the face which started a big brawl right up against the glass three rows in front of me. Tomas Kopecky (who was looking great, much more toned, and tougher all night long) and joined in as well as Ben Ondrus and we had quite an eventful last few seconds of the game. As we trickled out of the stadium, we were informed that Grigorenko had amassed a total 29 penalty minutes - interference, unsportsmanlike conduct, fighting, and two game misconducts. Uh, thanks for doing something, Igor.
  

I admit, I was a little worried in the first period when we couldn't get our offense up against what was effectively an AHL team, but we pulled it off in the end. I like to think the team was just as annoyed as me with the Leafs fan behind me (and don't get me wrong, I love the Leafs) who spent 90% of the game yelling as loud as possible "OUR B TEAM AGAINST YOUR A TEAM", "DATSUCKS", "OW HASEK PULLED HIS GROIN", and other similarly clever comments. He shut up after the first two goals. At least there was no reoccurring of "get the puck and skate with it".

You can view the rest of my shots from the game here - but don't get your hopes up too high, I forgot my camera at home and had to borrow one, which was less than amazing.

Lastly as some parting advice for anyone planning to get seats on the glass at a game in the near future, please do not ever, ever, think it is safe to set your full beer on the ledge. Or if you do, when Tomas Holmstrom slams into the glass right in front of you, and you turn, two seconds later, soaking wet and with froth in your hair, to the girl next to you, do not be surprised when she cannot stop laughing enough to breathe for the next minute and a half. I mean no, that wasn't me at all.

Wings gone Wild!

Preseason has officially begun, and the Wings started it off with a home and home of sorts against the Wild. Tuesday's game looked to have more of the rookies on offense and was still a brilliant 6-1 victory, while Thursday's game showed off the new potential defense and ended in a narrow 3-2 loss. I caught both games, one via the free Centre Ice Online trial and the other thanks to FSN's usually excellent support of Detroit sports on television last night and while much of both games was spent chatting with Wild fan Kirsten, I did get a few notes on the teams' performances:

• Wings potential goalie Jimmy Howard, who's been being groomed to take on the top spot for...well how ever many years exactly have we been hearing "future of Red Wings goaltending" now, was a serious bright spot in both games. He played the first half of Tuesday night and the second of Thursday and looked sharper than I've seen him with the Griffins. He lost some weight in the offseason and said in an interview that it was a major help - must be. My faith in his stock will go way up if he keeps performing this way. Howard also claims his goal this year is to make the AHL All Star team - good luck, kid.

• On the topic of goalies, Chris Osgood also looked phenomenal on Tuesday. I'm always a little nervous when he's in net, but his performance the other night, including a magnificent three part save, was enough to dispel that at least for a while. The quasi-tandem (assuming Ozzie gets several more starts than your standard backup thanks to the Wings trying to preserve Hasek's health throughout the season) of he and Hasek should be strong in net for us once again.

You're going the wrong way, boys.

• Pavel Datsyuk lit up the scoreboard Tuesday night with a goal and two assists - and so did Johan Franzen with two and one. Henrik Zetterberg, on the other hand, was held off the score sheet Thursday night, but still looked good. Jiri Hudler was given almost twenty minutes of playing time and while he didn't put up any points either, he had a few excellent scoring opportunities and was robbed by Minnesota's Josh Harding - it's easy to tell he's getting better with his long slapshots, both with timing and placement, though it looks like he still likes going right top shelf. Igor Grigorenko is still hanging around, but the commotion around him might be coming to a close if he doesn't step up soon.
  

• As for defensemen, the question of who will play up in the big leagues this year is still out there. Derek Meech needs to stay if the Wings don't want to risk losing him, but his proclaimed best buddy Kyle Quincey's making a good show as well. The kid had a strong showing during the playoffs last season, and while he looked a little shaky at the start of yesterday's game, he was going strong by the end and finished plus two. Both make the occasional rookie mistake, but neither look out of place on the roster with the veterans. The late training camp addition of Brent Sopel is proving interesting as well - he hasn't been perfect, but his name came up a lot, generally in a good sense, Tuesday night.

• The team's already been hit with the injury bug, though nothing looks too serious so far. Tomas Kopecky (groin), Brian Rafalski (hip-flexor) and Dan Cleary (ribs, though Babcock says none are broken), who was a major offensive force last year, are all on the DTD list - get better, boys!

• My favorite moment from both games was watching Derek Boogaard snag concurrent penalties in the first period, the second of which the announcers claimed was "5 for interference" after he launched himself at some poor Wing rookie. The resulting powerplay gave us two pp goals - the first of which was Chris Chelios unassisted.
  

As for the games themselves, they were both fun to watch and left me with a very optimistic feeling for the team this season. Granted, not a lot has changed, but I think the Wings did what they could to better themselves and all that's left now is to wait and see just how good a job they did. Preseason is far from over and a few questions remain, but we'll probably be seeing some answers in the next few days.

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In non Wing-related news, despite Centre Ice blacking out the Oilers/Canucks game last night, I did see the Oil take on the Leafs Tuesday - it tore horribly at my loyalties. The Oilers, who are still captainless, looked better than they have in a while, though it was painful to see so many familiar faces missing, even in the preseason where you expect as much. Their future, however, might be looking all right, too. My boy Ales Hemsky, playing on a line with Sam Gagner and Dustin Penner (half of which I would LOVE to see - bet you can guess which) scored a hat trick at the Joey Moss game, prompting the Edmonton Sun to run the most painfully pun-filled headline ever. I bet he missed getting pounced by Sykora after every goal. He also contributed a goal and an assist last night - thanks for shooting more, Ales! Meanwhile Dwayne Roloson is expected to start 50 games this season, with Mathieu Garon taking 32 - and Roli will do it in this gorgeous piece of equipment. Wow.

They haven't been left alone on the injury front either, though - and there are concerns now that my playoff hero Fernando Pisani might be worse off than anyone thought. Let's hope not.

I-95 HLOG Convention AKA Okay, the East isn't SO bad.

NPI has been pretty quiet these past few days - but rest assured, it isn't because we don't love you, it's because we ventured out into the southeast. But before I get into that, some other important news!

First, fellow blogger and generally awesome guy Teebz offered a couple weeks ago to send me a copy of the Heritage Classic dvd. I got it on Thursday and didn't have a chance to drop a thank you before then (especially because it's not just a copy, but a beautiful one with the labeling copied and in a real dvd case and everything!) but it's awesome. I had time to watch just the highlights before I left, but seeing all the old Oilers still together made me unbelievably happy - and I can't wait to see what sort of trouble Conks gets himself into. Thanks again, Teebz!

Second, last Thursday I was also featured in over at Interchangeable Parts as a part of their summer "Why You Love Hockey" feature. If you've never checked these ladies out, they're hilarious, and have been putting together a charming 118 part series of exactly why they love hockey all summer long - so if you want to see me make a grammatical fool of myself while professing my love for playoff parody songs, here's the link.

And now, down to business!

I-95 HLoG MegaConvention!
(Photo taken by some random equipment boy.)

This Friday, Saturday and Sunday Elly and I had the pleasure of flying/training our way down to Washington DC for a HLOG gathering including the two of us, CapsChick, Shmee, Pookie, Schnookie, and Teka. While the weekend consisted of much drinking and viewing movies such as The Cutting Edge (yet again), the highlight, by far, was the hockey.

I confess I know almost nothing about the Capitals, but the weekend turned into a sort of baptism by fire - I now know at least six or seven players (by their real names - another ten or so clock in with names given to them by the lot of us) and even have a favorite in Milan Jurcina (who CC got a great video of goofing around):

He's not Czech, but he's close.

I'm also the first to say I don't know nearly as much as I should about the East Conference as a whole, but some important happenings are clearly just meant to be documented, whether I get them quite right or not:

• Even though it wasn't like we had any cause or reason to take advantage of it, seeing and hearing in person just what Caps bloggers get access to was really awesome. As great as it would be the Wings would do something like that for those of us here, and as jealous as I am that we don't, it was just really cool to see the way the Caps are really trying to bring people in and work with them. Good job Capitals!

• Ovechkin is as hilarious as you're told. I missed his little dancing with Olie episode that everyone else seems to be reporting about, but watching him walk around the rink in a neon purple shirt satisfied me well enough. I was a little disappointed at how much we didn't actually see of him - he took one afternoon practice while some other players scrimmaged, and hung around for maybe an hour on Sunday, most of which I missed.
  

• I don't think the players appreciated us as much as we appreciated them, least of all Alexander Semin. After seeing him first fall over (could it be the result of hanging out with Malkin in the offseason?), then spend an entire drill sitting like this, and finally prance around shirtless for us (just so we get a few more hits for that one, I'd like to say the phrase "alex semin shirtless" here again...oh wait, no one's actually googling that?).

• The addition of Micheal Nylander to the team looks like a really great one - all practice long he was really intense, and at the very end he was showing a rookie some puck control drills that were absolutely brilliant. He could, however, benefit from getting someone to fix his shorts so he wasn't flashing thigh at us every time he passed.

• The Caps have had one of the by far better results when it comes to new uniforms, but the white ones, which I presume will be an issue for all teams, have this unfortunate tendency to become see-through when they get wet (henceforth known as Rod Brind'Amour Shorts Syndrome). This is not only ridiculous looking but also really unfortunate.
  

All in all the lot of us had an amazing weekend the likes of which all the HLOG meetups so far have been. Shmee did try to poison us with some sort of Rachel Ray concoction, but in the end it just succeeded in making us more obnoxious and her apartment more sticky, so we forgive her. Besides that, I know I didn't have a lot to say when forced to write that Caps love post earlier on in the season, but the boys looked really good out there - they've definitely built themselves up from last season and I might never hear the end of this, but I think I'll actually be keeping tabs on them when I can. I mean come on, I voluntarily went to two days worth of Caps training camp!

Last but not least, the Wings open up the preseason with a game against Kirsten's Wild - I'm interested to see what the line combinations will be as well as who will be getting a closer look in the upcoming preseason games. I have tickets to the Wings/Leafs game on the 29th and I'll be sure to keep everyone updated on what I see!

The Season's Getting Closer!

I just realized just how long I've been absent (has it really been since free agency started?). Anyway, a lot has happened - a lot I'm sure you all read about on blogs that are keeping themselves up to date much more than I am. Which I will now resume doing without week-long disappearances that provoke other bloggers to inquire as to if I've been able to leave my house without a bottle of vodka in one hand and a picture of Smytty in the other (short answer: yes, long answer: does beer count?). To start it off, the Wings have released their preseason schedule:

Detroit Red Wings 2007-2008 Preseason Schedule

Sept. 18 -- @ Minnesota
Sept. 21 -- vs. Minnesota
Sept. 22 -- vs. Pittsburgh
Sept. 24 -- @ Pittsburgh
Sept. 25 -- vs. NY Rangers
Sept. 27 -- vs Tampa Bay
Sept. 28 -- @ Toronto
Sept. 29 -- vs. Toronto

I'll probably make the Toronto game (which I'm very happy about seeing as the schedule meanswe won't be hosting Toronto during the regular season), but it's unlikely I'll get home from school to catch anything else. I'd like to see the Rangers (almost as much to see the Joe's reaction to Shanahan as much as for a certain Czech winger), but as it's a Tuesday it probably won't work out. I was sad about missing the Penguins as well but then some more interesting news cropped up:

The Hockey News is reporting a second outdoor game (the first being 2003's Heritage Classic between Edmonton and Montreal) in the works, at which the Penguins have already agreed to be the visiting team. The possible destinations for this game? Buffalo or Detroit.

The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review suggests the Penguins have agreed to be the visitors in the outdoor game, which will be broadcast on NBC (possibly marketed as “The Ice Bowl") and be held in either Buffalo or Detroit.

...

Should the game be held in Detroit, a likely location would be Spartan Stadium, where the "Cold War" game between U.S. colleges Michigan State and Michigan was played in 2001. That game drew a world-record hockey fan crowd of 74,554.

Should the game happen in Buffalo, it would be at the Ralph Wilson Stadium and, rumor has it, on New Year's Day. Let's all keep our fingers crossed for Detroit! (Can't you just see Hasek with a little toque a la Jose Theodore? Would it even fit on his mask?)