NHL play-off preview – Phoenix Coyotes vs Detroit Red Wings
One of the most storied NHL franchises takes on one of the lesser storied teams as the No.5 seed Detroit Red Wings face No.4 seed Phoenix Coyotes.
It will be a first-round series the Red Wings are expected to win, and their post-Olympic form makes them one of the more threatening opponents in the first round. They are 16-3-2 since the Games in Vancouver and have enough experience on the roster to know what is required to win.
Let’s not forget the Red Wings lost to the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Stanley Cup Finals last year, losing in seven games, so they’re not exactly going to be going into the play-offs with a "that-will-do" mentality.
The two teams split the season series 2-2-0, but haven't played since late January when the Coyotes won. In the month of March the Coyotes put a nine-game win-streak together and their goals against per game ranked third overall in the NHL. This isn’t going to be a walkover for any side.
It might be weird to have a team from the desert legitimately competing in the play-offs but after a season where everyone doubted them the Coyotes fully deserve to be the fourth seed.
If you thought this was going to be a high-scoring affair you couldn’t be more wrong. Both teams failed to score more than 230 goals in the regular season and none of the teams had a player in the top 20 for points scored. Pavel Datsyuk came in at a lowly 26th in the league and Phoenix’s top scorer was Shane Doan with 55 points.
Both teams finished in the top 10 in penalty-killing, but that’s where the similarities between the two teams end. Detroit were ninth in the league on the power play while the Coyotes struggled, finishing 28th in the NHL. The Coyotes were fifth in the league in five-on-five goals for/against ratio, compared to the Wings who were 21st.
This series could be quite a slog in which the Coyotes, who had 14 shootout victories in the regular season, could find themselves overpowered by the experienced Red Wings, but then again you don’t claim the No.4 seed by being a bad team.
Prediction: Red Wings in six hard-fought games.
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