I'm sure glad i went to the game last night, a last minute decision. It's good to see the youngsters taking the opportunity to make their case for next year's roster. Even with the OTL, I can at least feel like the team skated hard and generally put forth a serious effort. There may be nothing to play for, in regards to the team's place in the standings, BUT these matches don't happen in a vacuum, either. They all have an effect on the rest of the league. For example, DeTaint is on top of the Central Division, a familiar spot for them. The only challenger for that is, oddly, Nashville. I don't know about you, but I think that'd be hilarious, if the Blues contributed in some way to Detroit losing that spot. It would be a great extended-middle-finger to the schmucks in Michigan.
The Enemy: We know these putzes pretty well, so there's really not much to add here. The important, current details are thus: per today's post-practice press releases, Jimmy Howard is not playing tonight, so Joey MacDonald gets the start. In his 14 games this year, he's gone 2.13 /.930 and is 1-1-0 in his career against St Louis. This is the first time we've seen him this year. He will be backed up by Thomas McCollum, recently called up from the ECHL. Also notably absent tonight will be Pavel Datsyuk, who is still hurt and day-to-day. Both are targeting a return against Nashville on Saturday, so we've got that going for us, which is nice.
Further Reading:
Blues vs Red Wings coverage
DeTaint is Eastern time, so it's an early puck drop: 6:30 PM St Louis time. The broadcasts are on the usual outlets, FSMW for TV, and the mighty KMOX 1120AM for radio. The GDT thread should be around shortly beforehand. Until then, this is your own version of the pregame warmup. Get together here, chat, get your hate on, and take comfort in knowing that there's another generation of GameTimers coming, as evidenced by today's video. Tell us, little girl, what do you think about Detroit?
Ellie's amazing vocabulary pt. 2 (via fuel9000)
LGB!
-CrossCheckRaise