1 and 1000

When I turned on the tube to watch the game tonight, I was a little apprehensive, because Nic Lidstrom and Pavel Datsyuk were out. And are staying out until at least Monday. Fine. Let the young kids play, and gain some skills before we get to the playoffs. Now, lets review: Valteri Filppula scores the game winner 35 seconds into the game. See ya later Minnesota!

Moving on to the numbers:

0 - Number of goals allowed by Jimmy Howard.

2 - Number of Slovenian players in the NHL. (This will become clear to you in a moment.)

23 - number of saves Harding made before he got yanked for Hackett. Also the number of beers each member of the Jan Mursak fan club drank prior to the 2nd period. Yes, there is a Jan Mursak fan club. It's in Slovenia and they were at the Joe tonight. (See above)

19 - The number of saves Jimmy Howard made all night. Also the number of times Mickey Redmond said "Holy Jumpin!" during the telecast.

1 - Brendan Smith gets his first NHL goal. Which is good for him because if he's going to be the next Nik Lidstrom, he's got some catching up to do.

1000 - Ken Daniels has called his 1000th Red Wings game, which is roughly the same amount of New Years Ball Drops that Dick Clark has done.

Alright enough of that shit. Did anyone else notice that Todd Bertuzzi left in the middle of the game and didn't come back? Lower body injury. That really sucks because if the injury bug is about to bite, it had better do it NOW, and not 3 games before the playoffs. Right now the list sits at Datsyuk, Lidstrom, Ericsson, and now Bertuzzi. IF in fact that's really the truth. Teams in the NHL guard injury status closely. NHL GM's could work for the CIA. In any case, the Wings have two stars out of the lineup, and they can still win and win big. I mean, Filppula, Helm, and Smith put the game away. Zetterberg didn't score until it was 4-0. That's great! But I am sure that the fans would like to see a healthy team going into the first round.

So now the Red Wings have a home winning streak started again. OK, so ONE isn't really a streak, but they have to start somewhere.

On a side note, as my 11-year old son and I were going to the Everett Silvertips game (WHL hockey), I drop a Tweet to Landon Ferraro to tell him that we were going to see his old club, and that we would be wearing Red Wings gear. I didn't really expect to hear anything back... but...45 min later, I got a tweet back. This started a conversation that lasted about an hour or so, just chatting. My son was over the moon, and was telling everyone at the game that he "was twittering with Landon", as if he knew him his whole life...it was great to see the reactions on fans faces when he showed them my phone. So, thank you Landon, for not forgetting about the ordinary fan, and for making my son the happiest kid at the Silvertips game.

Except maybe for that one kid who won the dance contest...he may have been happier.

FOR KENNY: The Rangers lost to Tampa Bay (snicker) and they are 6-2-2 in their last 10. In fact, its all the overtime loss points that are keeping them near the top of the NHL. Wojtek Wolski got traded to Florida for a 2013 3rd round draft pick. THAT'S gotta make him feel good. Del Zotto, Callahan, and Fedotenko are out and listed as day-to-day.