On Saturday evening at Ohio Stadium—better known as the Horseshoe—in Columbus, the Detroit Red Wings will play in their fifth outdoor game (sixth if you count a 1954 game against the inmates at Marquette Branch Prison in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula), looking for revenge after the Blue Jackets beat them in Little Caesars Arena.
Here are a few questions to consider heading into the evening’s action.
How Will Dylan Larkin Respond to Todd McLellan’s Call Out?
The most attention-grabbing story to come from Thursday’s match-up between these two teams was Detroit coach Todd McLellan’s ‘call-out’ of his captain, Dylan Larkin. “I can’t beat around the bush: He was missing,” McLellan said of Larkin, before adding, “He’s a big boy. He can handle hearing that. He’s gonna hear it from me tomorrow. Just a lot of mishandles, unsure plays that he usually makes…We’re playing big games, we need our big players to play big games, and we’ll need more not only from him but from some others.”
At Friday’s press conference following the Red Wings’ practice on the Ohio Stadium, both McLellan and Larkin downplayed those remarks, with the coach saying his subsequent chat with Larkin himself (after the initial public comments) was an “easy conversation.” “He’s our captain, he cares, he’s committed to doing things right,” McLellan told reporters. “He had an off night. We all do. Coaches have off nights, other players have off nights. He’ll be ready to play, and we’re excited about watching him do that.”
Meanwhile, Larkin emphasized that McLellan’s review of his Thursday performance aligned with his own, saying, “I understand why he said it and probably would’ve said it myself if I spoke to you guys after the game. Wasn’t happy, haven’t been thrilled with how I’ve been playing, but the team’s been winning.”
Larkin was one of Detroit’s top performers in the return-from-break game against the Minnesota Wild last weekend at LCA; however, in the three games since, he’s delivered something less than his usual top-of-the-line-up presence. Perhaps that’s something lingering 4 Nations Face-Off fatigue, and Larkin himself suggested health/fatigue may be contributing to his present form, saying, “Going through some stuff right now to feel 100%, and I think I’ll be there.”
McLellan’s comments shouldn’t be taken as indicative of some sort of growing rift between coach and captain; instead, they are more a marker of culture building and establishing expectations from the top on down. Nonetheless, a public call-out of this nature heading into arguably the biggest stage of the regular season carries significance, and Larkin will surely be looking to deliver a strong response performance.
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Will Ice Conditions Allow for a Game Broadly Reminiscent of Everyday Indoor Hockey?
For whatever advancements the NHL has made in building a rink up to their standards outdoors, the league’s open-air games nonetheless tend to promote spectacle and environment over the hockey itself. Despite the league’s best efforts, the game inevitably takes on a different tone and tenor to standard NHL fare, in large part because of lesser ice conditions. The forecast for puck drop at 6 PM presently looks just about optimal: 29 degrees and mostly cloudy, though the forecast also calls for 15 mile-per-hour winds, a not insignificant potential variable.
In his Friday comments, McLellan pointed to three key variables in taking NHL hockey outside: ice (the most obvious), boards, and general spatial awareness. The league’s short-term outdoor rinks tend to take away from the predictability of pucks bouncing off the boards, inviting potential for some chaos. Meanwhile, to the note on spatial awareness, shifting the backdrop dramatically (fans at much greater remove than they would be in an NHL arena and an unconfined space) is perhaps the biggest disruption to normality on a shift-to-shift basis, making it impossible to see the game (in the most literal sense) as identical to any other regular season game.
McLellan, predictably, emphasized that the novel environment shouldn’t disrupt Detroit’s focus, saying, “Some of the players are in awe of it a little bit…but once the puck drops, it’s hockey. It’s just played in a different environment.”
Meanwhile, the Ohio Stadium backdrop on campus at Ohio State invites a collegiate feel. In his Friday remarks, Larkin—a proud University of Michigan alum—quipped that the environment is “probably the ugliest stadium I’ve ever been in, but it’s cool to play hockey outside.” Detroit has also equipped itself with skate guards in U-M’s traditional maize and blue, as the Red Wings look to replicate the Wolverines’ recent success at the Shoe.
Sean Shapiro (@seanshapiro) on X Wings have Michigan colored skate guards this week for obvious reasons. Justin Holl told me he might have to bring his old Minnesota skate guards instead
Can Red Wings Establish More Formidable Presence than They Managed Thursday vs. CBJ?
Finally, amidst all the spectacle and hoopla, there are two important points to play for between Eastern Conference wild card belligerents, and the Red Wings will be looking to put together a much stronger game than they managed in the Thursday night preview.
Defenseman Moritz Seider said his team was “outcompeted” by the Jackets Thursday at LCA, with Columbus’ control of the net front a driving factor in its eventual victory. To state the obvious, Detroit will be looking to stitch together something much more formidable Saturday evening.
It’s early yet for talk of ‘must-wins’ and obsessive daily standings watching, but as the Red Wings know all to well from last year, the Wild Card margins can be razor thin, so while dropping four straight points to a direct rival in that competition would not be devastating, but it certainly wouldn’t be a welcome development either.
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