Locked On Red Wings - Daily Podcast On The Detroit Red Wings Locked On Podcast Network

Berggren once again had the game winner, his 3rd of the series. His clutch scoring thrusts Grand Rapids into the divisional finals. Austin Czarnik and Carter Mazur also had one hell of a series. We also finish up our player evaluations, and the player leading us off? Alex DeBrincat.

Back in August we joined The Grind Line Podcast to try and predict how certain aspects of the season would play out. Today we rejoin them to look back and see how we did. Was the goaltending as good as we expected? Did the special teams take the step forward we hoped? Did they sniff the point total we were expecting?

The Griffins played one hell of a sloppy game Wednesday, as they were routed by the Ice Hogs 5-1. At 5v5, despite outshooting Rockford, it felt like nothing was going their way in the offensive or defensive zone. And special teams was much worse. 0/3 on the PP and 0/2 on the PK. Ugly game. We also continue to pick up where we left off with evaluations, as Lucas Raymond and Moritz Seider will recieve their flowers today.

Expectations for Larkin were highest of anyone going into the season, yet he still managed to exceed them. He battled adveristy on and off the ice to set a new career high goals in fewer games than last season. On the opposite end of the spectrum is Justin Holl, who despite being paid over $3M he was a healthy scratch most nights.

Expectations were low for Patrick Kane with the Red Wings due to a controversial surgery he had. He smashed through those expectations by being the Patrick Kane we all remember and being a point per game. We talk him and many others in part one of Postseason player evaluations.

Grand Rapids looked very Detroit in game one against the Rockford Ice Hogs, heavily outplaying them, but still finding they needed a comeback and OT winner to do steal the win. Jonatan Berggren got the OT winner and Sebastian Cossa looked strong in his playoff debut. Meanwhile, 2023 2nd round pick Andrew Gibson signed an ELC and will join the team. Finally, what should we expect of Derek Lalonde in year 3? #LGRW