San Jose Sharks eliminate Detroit Red Wings in Western Conference semi-finals Game 7 – NHL Analysis
The San Jose Shark eliminated the Detroit Red Wings, 3-2 in the final game seven of the National Hockey League (NHL) play-off Western Conference semi-finals at the HP Pavilion Centre in San Jose, California on Thursday.
San Jose avoided becoming part of a short list of teams who have collapsed after gaining a 3-0 advantage in the series than losing four consecutive games to lose the round. Detroit had a three game winning streak and an attempt at making history but could
not pull through in the final game as the home-ice advantage for the Sharks was enough for them to enter and leave the arena with confidence.
Obviously, the Red Wings were extremely exhausted after winning those back-to-back games as they had to give it all they had but they still managed to put up a good fight against San Jose who is entering the Western Conference finals for the second time
in a row. Breaking down game seven, it will be easier to depict what really caused the Detroit downfall after such a historic recovery.
Entering the match-up, the crowd was already on their feet and chanting, “Beat Detroit!’. Starting off the matchup, the Sharks fired a couple of shots in the opening two minutes which gave the feeling that they would be playing with more energy than usual.
It was nearly mid-way through the first period and both teams had not scored yet. As the physical play was rising between Ryane Clowe and Todd Bertuzzi, both teams were more than ready to tear each other apart even though they have met for seven consecutive
games. Detroit goalie Jimmy Howard stopped six shot attempts but finally fell short on Devin Setoguchi’s slap-shot from 50 feet at the 12:20 mark. San Jose’s Logan Couture extended the lead with 59 seconds remaining off a wrist-shot on their first power-play
opportunity and ended the first period 2-0.
Todd Bertuzzi went out in the second period after taking a hit on the boards with symptoms of an upper-body injury. Pavel Datsyuk gave the only penalty of the period at the mid-way point when he was penalised for interference. Henrik Zetterberg scored three
minutes later after they killed San Jose’s added man advantage for their first goal of the game. The Red Wings took the most attempts (17) in the second period while San Jose only had six. After an intense fight from both sides, the period ended with Detroit
still in deficit 2-1.
San Jose was booked for having too many men on the ice and gave an early power-play opportunity to the Red Wings, but luckily nearly a minute later, Niklas Kronwall was sent out for slashing and the men on ice were levelled 4-4. Pavel Datsyuk scored the
final goal of the game as Detroit came within a point of tying it but were locked down in the remaining six minutes finally ending the period 3-2. Torrey Mitchell gave the Red Wings another added man advantage a minute after Datsyuk’s goal but the Sharks managed
to kill it off.
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