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‘D’ Is The Difference
by Paul on 05/13/08 at 07:02 AM ET
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from Eric Duhatschek of the Globe and Mail,
Whereas Lidstrom is one of the steadiest, smartest rearguards in the game, he plays the classic “contain” style. He makes excellent first passes, eats minutes and generally plays a textbook style of defence. Pretty soon, he’ll be in the heady company of Bobby Orr and Doug Harvey in terms of the number of times they have won the James Norris Memorial Trophy.
Kronwall is different. Less is known about him because he always seems to be hurt, suffering one freak injury after another, year after discouraging year. It’s contributed to his anonymity and obscures the fact that he plays more like Ulf Samuelsson than Anders Eriksson; he is arguably Detroit’s most physical defenceman since Vladimir Konstantinov was lost after that limousine accident.
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The comparison between the Konstantinov and Kronwall is a good one.
Kronwall obviously doesn’t have the incredibly-mean, nasty edge that Vlad had in his prime, but Kronwall also is arguably a better and more-feared hitter in open ice than Konstantinov was. I forget if it was on On the Fly or Versus the other night, but they actually made a good point that Kronwall comes into the offensive zone to make big hits, which is something you don’t see too many defensemen do, and that’s a difference in his game. When he’s not pinching offensively, he’s lining someone up anyways and in some cases he disrupts them moving the puck up the ice…
Konstantinov however was rounding into a true Norris-caliber defenseman before the accident. It remains to be seen if Kronwall can make that same transformation.
I’d also like to point out that Brad Stuart has been a complete stud for Detroit in this series and his play is highly underrated and under-appreciated. He does everything Lilja does, except he can be trusted with the puck and he chips in offensively too. What’s not to love about that? And Stuart’s presence has only emboldened Kronwall even more…
Posted by Primis on 05/13/08 at 07:50 AM ET