0404150138
DETROIT FREE PRESS
040415
Thursday, April 15, 2004
METRO FINAL
1A
Photos by DAVID P. GILKEY/Detroit Free Press
Captain Steve Yzerman and his charges returned Wednesday to Joe Louis Arena
after two bad loses at Nashville.
Curtis Joseph will need a stiff upper lip - and probably a stiff lower lip,
too - as he takes over for Manny Legace as the Red Wings' starting goaltender
in tonight's pivotal Game 5. "We've got to be better, no question, everybody
in the room knows it," Joseph said.
MITCH ALBOM FREE PRESS COLUMNIST
SIDEBAR ATTACHED
Copyright (c) 2004, Detroit Free Press
A LEGACY AT STAKE
WILL THE WINGS BE REMEMBERED FOR THE CUPS OR THE FIRST-ROUND EXITS?
So they changed the goalie and they're back on home ice and they are saying
the right things about patience and experience. Here's the cold truth: The
legacy of these Red Wings is on the line tonight at Joe Louis Arena. If this
team of All-Stars, assembled on Mt. Olympus, paid for with chests of gold,
should nonetheless be slashed in its Achilles' heel by the lowly Nashville
Predators, history will not be kind. A hockey paradise will have been
squandered.
Let's face it. While the Red Wings have brought much joy and Stanley Cups to
Detroit, sports is a what-have-you-done-for-us-lately business. And if the
Wings lose Game 5 tonight and proceed to drop this series, three of the last
four years would be first-round exits.
Heck. You don't need future Hall of Famers for that. You don't need Brett
Hull, Steve Yzerman or Nicklas Lidstrom for that. You don't need All-Star
goalies such as Dominik Hasek and Curtis Joseph for that. You don't even need
Manny Legace for that! You can cobble together a band of lowly paid, hungry
young players and scrape and claw your way into an eighth seed. That way, if
you exit early, people can say, "What did you expect? They did their best."
You can't say that about these Red Wings right now. This is not their best.
Not six goals in four games. Not early deficits. Not a loss of composure. We
know upstart teams rev it up in the postseason, but the same should hold true
for champions. You don't just sit there and say, "Well, Nashville's an eighth
seed but they're gonna be tough." You say, "Hey, WE led the league in points.
We'll show you what tough is."
Instead, after four games, these two teams are even, it's a best-of-three
series, and the Wings are singing familiar laments -- "We have to stop
pressing to score." . . . "We have to do the little things." . . . "We have to
stay calm."
We've heard it all before.
"Am I surprised that we're 2-2 now?" Yzerman, the captain, said in the
aftermath of the Game 4 shutout. "No. I'm disappointed, but not surprised."
For the Wings to keep their lofty reputation, there can be no more
disappointments. And no more surprises.
Manny out, Cujo in
"I'm putting Curtis in because we want to get a win, I want to change some
things," coach Dave Lewis said Wednesday in announcing that Joseph would
replace Legace in net for tonight's pivotal contest at Joe Louis Arena.
"Curtis has got tremendous experience, he knows how to deal with the pressure
and this is a perfect situation for him to be in."
Well, I'm glad it's perfect for someone. But the truth is, goaltender is just
the easiest position to switch, not the one that always makes the difference.
You could argue that Legace actually played better than most of his fellow Red
Wings. The goals he surrendered have been -- for the most part -- awfully
tough to stop. When the opponent is streaking down the ice, all alone, puck on
stick, you can only do so much.
What would truly change the Red Wings' luck is if some Nashville productivity
rubbed off on them. The Wings are taking batting practice out there -- and
hitting them all into someone's glove. Eighty-three shots in the last two
games -- and one goal to show for it?
OK. That's not normal. But it's also not new. The Wings, playoff after
playoff, seem to go through a stretch like this, and soon every star (which on
Detroit means almost anyone with a stick) thinks he can make the perfect shot
to break the slump.
Never works. Inevitably, these lulls are broken by a weird bounce, a ricochet
or a misdirect. We know this. They know this.
Why must they torture themselves with the same problem year after year?
Same old, same old
Who knows? But I can tell you this. The fatigue is showing. The feistiness
that you once saw when the Wings fell behind an inferior opponent is withered
now. It has turned more to annoyance and frustration. They know they are
better. But they knew they were better than Anaheim in 2003 and Los Angeles in
2001. This is no longer fun. It's no longer a challenge. It's simply a drag.
And if you think this is getting old for you? It's getting really old for the
Wings.
"I can't help it if I touch a guy and he goes down," lamented Brendan
Shanahan, echoing a Detroit sentiment that the referees are too quick with
their whistles in this series and the Predators are too quick to lick the ice.
"But hey, we can't let that get to us, like we did (in Game 4). We have to
calm down, get our own game back."
That game is winning. Detroit does it in the regular season. And obviously has
done it in many postseasons. But the Wings' reputation as winners will change
if they fail in this series. It's that basic. True, even the best teams don't
win all the time. The Yankees are proving that in baseball. But there is a
difference between dropping Game 6 or 7 of the World Series and getting swept
in the first round by Anaheim -- or blowing a 2-0 series lead to Nashville.
You can make any excuse you want: doing that back-to-back is inexcusable.
"We've got to be better, no question, everybody in the room knows it," said
Joseph, who emerges into a huge spotlight tonight. "We all have to elevate our
games to another level."
How about just the level fans -- and management -- have come to expect from a
team this talented? Nashville? Whodathunk? But make no mistake. This series is
simply and undeniably a tipping point for the Red Wings' legacy, the
difference between remembering them, decades from now, as a success or a
failure.
Sorry to be so blunt. But the Wings created this moment. It's theirs to fix or
fumble.
Contact MITCH ALBOM at 313-223-4581 or albom@freepress.com. Catch "The Mitch
Albom Show" 3-6 p.m. weekdays on WJR-AM (760). Also catch "Monday Sports
Albom" 7-8 p.m. Mondays on WJR. To read recent columns by Albom, go to
www.freep.com/index/albom.
PLAYOFF HISTORY
Since missing the playoffs in 1990, the Red Wings have won the Stanley Cup
three times and have been eliminated in the first round five times. Their
first-round series with Nashville is tied at 2-2.
1991: Lost to St. Louis, 4-3, in first round.
1992: Lost to Chicago, 4-0, in second round.
1993: Lost to Toronto, 4-3, in first round.
1994: Lost to San Jose, 4-3, in first round.
1995: Lost to New Jersey, 4-0, in Stanley Cup finals.
1996: Lost to Colorado, 4-2, in Western Conference finals.
1997: Beat Philadelphia, 4-0, in Stanley Cup finals.
1998: Beat Washington, 4-0, in Stanley Cup finals.
1999: Lost to Colorado, 4-2, in second round.
2000: Lost to Colorado, 4-1, in second round.
2001: Lost to Los Angeles, 4-2, in first round.
2002: Beat Carolina, 4-1, in Stanley Cup finals.
2003: Lost to Anaheim, 4-0, in first round.
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