WINGS FINISH 5th IN WESTERN CONFERENCE, ARE LOOKING FOR ANOTHER SUCCESSFUL POST-SEASON
Kris Draper's second season as the GM of the Red Wings was successful, as they were able to hit 100 points. The start for the season, however, was very bad. From first 15 games they lost 11 (4-9-2). It was a horrible start but the Wings were able to bounce back strongly and had a solid run in the last 67 games (42-19-6). Mike Babcock had a lot of bad things to say about that horrible start.
"In those first 15 games we were horrible everywhere. We weren't able to play solid game in our own zone. The passes we made from our own zone were horrible. Our players didn't backcheck or forecheck like they should've had. Our goaltending wasn't good. We weren't able to create anything offensively. Our power play and penalty killing were disgusting", Babcock told.
But the Wings worked hard and the things started to work out. Their special man units were one of the biggest reason in their success. Their penalty killing turned from league worst to clearly the best one of the league - in the end of the season their penalty killing-% was 89.1%, being nearly 3% better than the second best penalty killing-% (Tampa Bay, 86.2%). Their power play-% was 18.7%, good enough for 7th best in the league.
UFA signing Simon Gagne was one of the biggest reasons in the Detroit's phenomenal penalty killing.
Datsyuk, Zetterberg, Howard and Kronwall all had individually very good seasons. Datsyuk is considered as the front-runner in the Frank J. Selke Trophy. Datsyuk, who had 76 points in the regular season, led all the players in take-aways with 155. Detroit's captain, Henrik Zetterberg, had very good season, scoring 72 points. Jimmy Howard probably won't win another Ted Lindsay award but he had 4th best save percentage in the league and 3rd lowest goals against average although playing more than any other goalie (75 games, Niklas Bäckström had second most with 67 games played). Niklas Kronwall is once again in the Norris Trophy race. Kronwall scored 44 points in the regular season, good enough for fourth most amongst defenders.
The Detroit Red Wings will face 4th seeded Anaheim Ducks in the first round of the playoffs.
TEAM STATS
Goals for: 230, 2.80 per game (7th most in league)
Goals against: 192, 2.34 (7th least in league)
Power play: 54/291, 18.7% (7th best in league)
Penalty kill: 261/293, 89.1% (best in league)
PLAYER STATS
C Pavel Datsyuk 33 goals, 43 assists, 76 points
C Henrik Zetterberg 29 goals, 43 assists, 72 points
RW Jam Mursak 26 goals, 27 assists, 53 points
LW Milan Michalek 19 goals, 30 assists, 49 points
RW Johan Franzen 22 goals, 26 assists, 48 points
D Niklas Kronwall 9 goals, 35 assists, 44 points
C Valtteri Filppula 22 goals, 22 assists, 44 points
D Kyle Quincey 4 goals, 29 assists, 33 points
LW Simon Gagne 14 goals, 13 assists, 27 points
D Brendan Smith 2 goals, 24 assists, 26 points
RW Gustav Nyquist 7 goals, 18 assists, 25 points
C Darren Helm 9 goals, 15 assists, 24 points
C Cory Emmerton 6 goals, 14 assists, 20 points
D Danny DeKeyser 2 goals, 14 assists, 16 points
D Jonathan Ericsson 5 goals, 7 assists, 12 points
LW Justin Abdelkader 5 goals, 5 assists, 10 points
C Tomas Tatar 6 goals, 3 assists, 9 points
Goalie stats
Jimmy Howard 75 games played, 43-26-6 record, .925, 9 shutouts, 2.25 gaa
Jonas Gustavsson 7 games played, 3-2-2 record, .956, 2 shutouts, 1.17 gaa
