Goalie Carousel Continues For Red Wings; Team Hopes To Build On Thursday's Game
By Ashley Dunkak
@AshleyDunkak
CBS DETROIT - Both Jimmy Howard and Petr Mrazek have had multiple opportunities to take hold of the number one goaltender job for the Detroit Red Wings. Over the last six games, neither has put together a body of work convincing enough for head coach Mike Babcock to decide between them.
As a result, with only five games remaining in the regular season, the Red Wings will continue - at least for the next two games - to alternate between Howard and Mrazek.
Babcock announced Friday that Howard will get the start Saturday against the Minnesota Wild, and Mrazek will get the start Sunday against the Washington Capitals.
"Just because we've had no luck with back-to-backs, and so this way we thought it was - they're both getting one," Babcock said after practice. "I haven't thought any more than that. We feel that gives us our best chance to have success in both games."
In terms of wins, success has largely evaded the Red Wings over the past month. The team has lost 11 of its last 15 games and now sits tied with the Boston Bruins for third place in the division.
When Detroit won 9 of their 12 games in January, it seemed that for the first time in a few years there would not be drama about the team's playoff status as the regular season wound down. The month of March, of course, has led to the current crunch, which by now is a familiar one for the Red Wings.
However, Babcock liked how the team played in Thursday's loss to Boston, particularly on the penalty kill and the power play. He conveyed a belief the Red Wings are going in the right direction.
"I was real positive yesterday when I left," Babcock said. "Did I want to win? Absolutely. But I'm a big believer [that] in life if you do good things, good things happen. Me, I just focus on the process all the time. We got to choose our attitude today, everyone was good, we had good energy, we went out and were very business-like ... We'll be dialed in. We'll be ready to go.
"We're in a good situation in that we're in control of our own destiny," Babcock added. "We've got to play real well, though, and we've got to find a way to get a win."
Babcock said the Red Wings played well enough Thursday that they should have won the game. Red Wings forward Justin Abdelkader expressed a similar sentiment and added that the upcoming stretch of games will be a defining one for the Red Wings.
"I think the urgency level has increased already," Abdelkader said. "I think last night we did a lot of good things, we played well. Just a couple pucks went in our net. I think if you play like that, you'll win a majority of those games. Hopefully we can build off that. We've got a big stretch here, we've got going to Minnesota where the team is playing well, they're always playing well there, and never an easy place to win, so it'll be a good challenge for us. I think we'll see what our group's made of this last five games."