Duffer’s Dabbles: Red Wings’ Fast Starts Don’t Lead To Fantastic Finishes

The 1-0-1 Detroit Red Wings have claimed points from each of their first two games of the season. They’ve scored nine goals. The faithful are excited.

They also have short memories.

Fast starts under coach Jeff Blashill are commonplace for the Red Wings. Fantastic finishes are not. In fact, in the majority of seasons under Blashill, the team has broken from the gate effectively.

Last season, the Red Wings were 2-2 after four games. Then came an eight-game losing streak. In 2019-20, the Wings opened 3-1. That was also followed by an eight-game losing streak.

In 2018-19, the Wings got the skid out of the way off the bat. They opened 0-7. A 4-1 launch to the 2017-18 season was immediately followed by a six-game slide.

Blashill’s Red Wings were 5-2 after seven games in 2016-17. Then they lost six in a row. A 3-0 beginning in Blashill’s first season behind the Red Wings bench was followed by four successive losses.

The message here is to keep in mind what Blashill himself likes to talk about. It’s a small sample size. Let’s see where the Red Wings stand after 10 games before making any early assessments about this team.

Wrong Russian Five

It turns out that news reports out of Russia had the wrong member of the Red Wings Russian Five who is going to be part of Alexei Zhamonv’s staff at the Beijing Winter Olympics.

Alexey Zhamnov, Sergey Gonchar, Alexey Kudashov, Sergei Fedorov and Yevgeny Nabokov will lead Team Russia at #Beijing2022 🔥🔥🔥 https://t.co/M40a0hCwqE pic.twitter.com/6Y3MnwnWei

— Gillian Kemmerer (@gilliankemmerer) October 18, 2021

It’s not going to be Igor Larionov but Sergei Fedorov who is joining Zhamnov as an assistant coach. Fedorov is coach of CSKA Moscow.

Around The League

Vancouver: The son and daughter of Canucks GM Jim Benning were assaulted outside a Vancouver nightclub.

Washington: The Capitals lost goalie Vitek Vanecek to the Seattle Kraken in the NHL epxansion draft. Then they reacquired him in a trade. Now he’s staking his claim as Washington’s No. 1 netminder.

Vegas: Facing three games in five days this week, the Golden Knights are missing six forwards, including Max Pacioretty and Mark Stone. But they could be getting Nicolas Roy back.

Washington: Former Red Wings defenseman Dennis Cholowski is hoping the Capitals are the team where a regular NHL opportunity knocks for him.

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