What Will Happen with the Detroit Red Wings and New York Rangers?
Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet was on Sirius XM NHL Network Radio with Gord Stellick and Scott Laughlin and was asked what will happen with the Detroit Red Wings and New York Rangers if they don’t make the playoffs.
NHLRumors.com Transcriptions
Gord Stellick: “Now, what I’m wondering, okay, in the East I look at okay, what a great, great race for the final playoff spot. The two teams that have to be ticked if they don’t make it, I would think the two most, I mean, Boston’s already acted, but the New York Rangers and Detroit Red Wings.
In one or either case, if they fall short, it won’t be by much. Do they go, let’s just get back at it, back at the drawing board? Or do one or both of them look at, what do you want to call it consequences, or shuffling or doing a deeper dive?”
Elliotte Friedman: “So I got to tell you, I looked at the standings last night, Gordie and Boston is last in the East. Is that not unbelievable? I just looked at it. I looked at my smartphone for a couple of minutes while I was staring at the standings. Like I cannot believe this. Not only it’s just Boston, you don’t expect that, but secondly it basically since the deadline, they have completely phoned it in. It’s unreal, anyway.
The Rangers, this whole season, have been completely unsettled. They have Gabe Perreault making his debut night. I think there’s some excitement about that. Like, they have the best goalie, Gordie. So whenever people talk about who’s going to make the playoffs from the East, a lot of the reasoning I hear is Rangers because they have the best goalie. But they’ve been so unsettled all year, such a mess all year, that it wouldn’t surprise anybody if they didn’t make it. I mean, just so thrown off all season.
Detroit, the thing about them, Gordie, is that if you look at them the last few years, they always get close. Always get close, and then right when they get there, it just never happens for them. They lose. Like night , like St. Louis is red hot, but they almost all the way. St Louis ties it with what, 30 seconds left? And then they win it in overtime. Like, that is the way it’s gone for Detroit. You get to the edge and you can’t get over.
And I got to think like they’re looking at this internally in Detroit, like (Steve) Yzerman, who’s one of the biggest killers of all time. He’s probably sitting there and saying, how do we get this last step? How do we get the Killer Instinct where we can take advantage of these moments, when we close, when we’re close, and to me, that’s all attitude, as much as anything else.
Like they’re right there. They just, when you think they’re gonna fall out, they climb back in, but when they really have a chance to get in there, they just can’t do it. And that one’s a harder one to fix. That’s an attitude thing, that’s not necessarily an acquisition thing.”
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