Merry Christmas to all! The Blue Jackets will try again to give us fans the present of a complete game and a 2 points tonight in the “Hockey Town”
7:00pm EST, Fox Sports Ohio, High Definition
The Blue Jackets have not won in Detroit since last March when the CBJ went to Motown and upended the defending champs 8-2. Since then though, the Jackets have been all but feeble against the Red Wings, and to compound the issues against the Wings, the Jackets are riding an 8 game losing streak.
At this point I am almost at a loss for what to say when it comes to finding what it will take to get the Jackets going the right direction. I did take a few minutes to compare last season’s run to the playoffs to this current situation:
First 38 games 2008-09: 18-16-4, 40 points
Final 44 games 2008-09: 23-15-6, 52 points
Final record/points: 41-31-10, 92 points, 7th place in the Western Conference
First 38 games 2009-10: 14-17-7, 35 points
RECORD NEEDED to reach 92 points: 28-15-1, 57 points
Simply put, the Jackets have about 15 losses to give before they would not be able to reach the approximate required points to finish in the top 8 after all teams have completed 82 games. Now yes, 92 could shift up or down, for example since the Blue Jackets entered the NHL, the lowest point total to make the top 8 was 90 points while the highest minimum was 96.
I’m not saying this to be doom and gloom, but to be realistic. It would be outstanding to see the Jackets put together a run similar to what they achieved last year, but the likelihood of that kind of thing happening twice is probably not very good.
Back to the task at hand, the Blue Jackets need this win like never before. The Red Wings are without a slew of bodies tonight, so expect lat least a few new names:
• Injury update: C Valtteri Filppula (wrist) and D Brian Rafalski (flu) are probable. C Henrik Zetterberg (shoulder), D Jonathan Ericsson (knee), LW Dan Cleary (shoulder), D Niklas Kronwall (knee), RW Jason Williams (leg), LW Johan Franzen (knee) and D Andreas Lilja (concussion) are out.
Garon will get the start tonight and Stralman returns to the line-up. Nothing else to be said…
GO JACKETS!!!!!
