Game 1!!  Questions abound:  Did the Wings have too much time off?  Will Fil play?  Which team’s style will win out: Dallas’ chip-and-chase or Detroit’s puck possession?  Which Marty Turco appears, the one who really has issues at Joe Louis Arena (0-4 since 2005-06), or the one that never gave up more than two goals in regulation against the Sharks (despite DAL being outshot in 4 of the 6 games)?

Hopefully, we will have some answers tonight!!

As usual, MSM is in the replies.

GAMEDAY at TSN.ca:

DET HOT:

Chris Osgood (G)
6-0-0, 1.52, .937 in last 7 GPI
Pavel Datsyuk (C/LW)
6 pts in last 2 GP
Henrik Zetterberg (LW/C)
6 pts in last 2 GP
Johan Franzen (LW/C)
10 pts in last 4 GP
Mikael Samuelsson (RW)
4 pts in last 2 GP
Nicklas Lidstrom (D)
3 pts in last 2 GP
Jiri Hudler (RW/LW)
5 pts in last 5 GP
Tomas Holmstrom (RW/LW)
3 pts in last 3 GP
Valtteri Filppula (C/W)
4 pts in last 4 GP

DET COLD:

Kris Draper (C/W)
0 pts in last 7 GP
Dan Cleary (LW/RW)
0 pts in last 3 GP
Chris Chelios (D)
0 pts in last 9 GP

DAL HOT:

Marty Turco (G)
1-1-0, 1.27, .952 in last 2 GPI
Antti Miettinen (RW/LW)
2 pts in last 2 GP
Mike Modano (C)
2 pts in last 2 GP
Brenden Morrow (LW)
2 pts in last 2 GP
Sergei Zubov (D)
2 pts in last 2 GP

DAL COLD

Niklas Hagman (LW/RW)
0 pts in last 4 GP
Loui Eriksson (LW/RW)
0 pts in last 4 GP
Stephane Robidas (D)
1 pts in last 5 GP
Jere Lehtinen (RW/LW)
2 pts in last 6 GP

Injury Report, from GAMEDAY at TSN.ca

DET:

Tomas Kopecky (W/C)
Torn MCL, sidelined indefinitely
Kirk Maltby (RW/LW)
Hamstring, day-to-day

DAL:

Stu Barnes (C/W)
Head injury, day-to-day
Philippe Boucher (D)
Lower body injury, day-to-day

HEAD TO HEAD Analysisfrom CBC.ca:

Stars Scoring Red Wings
35 Total Goals 38
24 Opp. Goals 21
60 Assists 64
37 Opp. Assists 38
2 Empty Net Goals 2
1 Opp. Empty Net Goals 1
3 Unassisted Goals 2
4 Opp. Unassisted Goals 0
3 OT Goals 1
360 Shots On Goal 393
324 Opp. Shots On Goal 249
1 Shutouts 1
0 Opp. Shutouts 0
Stars Special Teams Red Wings
60 Power Play Opportunities 49
15 Power Play Goals 10
25.0% Power Play % 20.4%
29 Power Play Assists 20
49 Short Handed Opportunities 42
0 Short Handed Goals 3
85.7% Penalty Kill % 85.7%
0 Short Handed Assists 3
Stars Penalties Red Wings
63 Total Penalties 49
0 Penalties Major 1
62 Penalties Minor 48
134 Penalty Minutes 101

PLAYOFF TEAM STATS: From NHL.com:

WINP% G/G GA/G 5-5 F/A PP% PK% S/G SA/G Sc1%

DET: PLAYOFFS:  .800 (2nd), 3.80 (1st), 2.10 (3rd), 1.64 (1st), 20.4 (9th), 85.4 (4th), 39.3 (1st), 24.9 (1st), .857 (4th)

DAL: PLAYOFFS:  .667 (3rd), 2.92 (5th), 2.00 (2nd), 1.36 (3rd), 25.0 (2nd), 85.7 (5th), 30.0 (8th), 27.0 (3rd). .667 (7th)

Jeff Sagarin NHL RATINGS from USATODAY.com:

Through games of May 4, 2008

HOME ADVANTAGE = 0.25 . . . . .  RATING . . W . . L . . SCED(RANK) . . VS top 10.| VS top 16
1 Detroit Red Wings . . . . . . . .  = 5.24 62 30 4.02 (15) 20 5 | 40 19
2 Dallas Stars . . . . . . . . . . . .  = 4.74 53 41 4.16 (9) 26 18 | 37 28

Helene St. James and George Sipple have injury updates, and some good quotes from Coach Babcock regarding Kronwall, from the Detroit Free Press :

Forward Valtteri Filppula (leg) practiced for the first time this week but remains questionable for Game 1. “Fil skated real well today,” Wings coach Mike Babcock said on Wednesday. “We’re going to find out tomorrow.” If Filppula can’t play, Kirk Maltby will make his first appearance of the playoffs. He has been sidelined by a hamstring injury. Defenseman Chris Chelios, who missed Game 4 with a leg injury, said he’s fine and ready to play.

ON THE PROWL: Mike Babcock said defenseman Niklas Kronwall remembers the hit delivered by Stars center and fellow Swede Joel Lundqvist that caused him to miss last year’s playoffs. Kronwall has delivered some devastating hits of his own during the first two rounds of the playoffs and has eight assists in 10 games.

“Nik’s out there hunting you down,” Babcock said. “He’s looking for you. He’s going to get somebody in this series, I guarantee it. Now they’re going to be trying to get him, but he just makes you nervous. You gotta know where he is.

“I guarantee he remembers Lundqvist putting him out of the playoffs last year. Players have good memories. So Lundqvist is a good body checker, comes after you hard. But Kronner’s a good body checker too.”

John Niyo has some notes regarding the potential splitting of the Lidstrom/Rafalski pair, from the Detroit News:

A healthy blue line gives Mike Babcock more flexibility than he had a year ago in the Western Conference finals. And the Wings coach may be planning to make use of that luxury.

At Wednesday’s practice, Babcock split his top defensive pairing and had Nicklas Lidstrom skating with Brad Stuart, while Brian Rafalski joined Niklas Kronwall.

If he sticks with that, the reason would be to add a more physical presence alongside Lidstrom, who’ll likely be used extensively against the Stars’ top line of Mike Ribeiro and Brenden Morrow, a hard-hitting left winger who leads his team with seven playoff goals, including two overtime winners.

“We’ve got two real physical guys on the back end that hunt down players and we like players that we’re playing against to be a little bit nervous,” Babcock said.

Rafalski and Kronwall, whose open-ice hits have played a big role for the Wings, probably will see the bulk of the ice time against the Stars’ second line, centered by Brad Richards.

Here is the latest injury news for the Dallas Stars, from the Dallas Morning News:

Barnes, Boucher, doubtful: Stu Barnes (concussion-like symptoms) and Philippe Boucher (hip strain) skated Wednesday morning, but both are being listed as doubtful for Game 1 by Tippett.

Barnes said he felt much better and would continue to test himself at the morning skate today. Boucher said he was happy to simply be on the trip and at last on the map to play in the series.

Tippett used Brad Winchester on the fourth line in practice (basically, taking Barnes’ place in the lineup) and moved Niklas Hagman and Antti Miettinen up to the third line with Mike Modano. If Barnes is healthy, Tippett would probably play Barnes and Steve Ott with Modano, and then place Hagman and Miettinen with Toby Petersen.

Now this is incredibly interesting, the staff writers at the Dallas Morning News offer up their predictions, NONE of the FIVE Writers picks Dallas?

Tim Cowlishaw
Red Wings over Stars in 7: Stars are playing winning hockey, but it’s hard to take advantage of their depth at center when the Red Wings keep the puck all the time.

Flyers over Penguins in 6: Philly spoils the Sidney Crosby party.

Kevin Sherrington
Red Wings over Stars in 7: Stars have been gutty and gritty. But did you see Detroit beat Colorado, 8-2? Yeow.

Penguins over Flyers in 6: Sidney Crosby wins the Battle of Pennsylvania, then concedes to Michigan.

Jean-Jacques Taylor
Red Wings over Stars in 6: Gritty stars don’t have quite enough left after draining San Jose series.

Penguins over Flyers in 6: The Pens have way too much firepower for their cross-state rivals.

Mike Heika
Red Wings over Stars in 7: The Red Wings know how to protect home ice like few teams in the NHL.

Penguins over Flyers in 7: Pittsburgh takes advantage on enough power plays to make the difference.

Chuck Carlton
Red Wings over Stars in 6: The Stars work hard and smart, and Turco steals a game, but Detroit’s forwards are too much.

Flyers over Penguins in 7: Crosby and Malkin in the Cup Finals would be huge for NHL. League’s tough luck persists.

Filppula is playing tonight!!  From KHAN! at MLIVE.com:

Update from the morning skate: Valterri Filppula will play tonight in Game 1 vs. Dallas after missing two days of practices earlier this week with a leg injury. There are no lineup changes for the Wings.

“I felt good,’’ Filppula said. “We played a lot this season, so missing a couple of days I don’t think is going to be a big deal.’’

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The Highlander also notes Fil is playing: 

Coach Mike Babcock said today that Valtteri Filppula will be in the lineup tonight for Game 1 against Dallas. That means that Kirk Maltby will be a healthy scratch and Dan Cleary will skate on the third line with Dallas Drake and Kris Draper.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Stars practice update from the Dallas Morning News:

No Stu Barnes (concussion-like symptoms) for Game 1, but he stayed out long after the morning skate messing around with his fellow scratches, and said he felt really good afterward.

He said he’s a possibility for Game 2.

I asked what has to do to be ready, and he said he just has to know that he can give 100 percent.

``You just have to be sure of yourself,’’ he said. ``This is an important time.’’

Philippe Boucher (hip strain) also skated a lot, but said he’s not ready to talk about returning to the lineup. He said we’d know when he was getting close, and he’s not getting close yet.

Brad Winchester is probably in tonight on a fourth line of:

Winchester-Petersen-Ott.

Wings will win this series, in 5 or 6, probably 5.

I hope they light up Turco often and nothing would please me more than to see Turco stripped of the puck while he comes out of the net to handle it, which he does all too often, unfortunately most times effectively.