Red Wings play through Lidstrom injury
No Nicklas Lidstrom. No Pavel Datsyuk. No Kris Draper.
No problem for the Detroit Red Wings.
Though the defending Stanley Cup champions took the ice for Game 4 of the Western Conference finals minus a few injured stars - headlined by the absence of Lidstrom, a six-time Norris Trophy-winning defenseman - the Red Wings nevertheless dominated the Blackhawks in a 6-1 victory Sunday at the United Center to take a 3-1 series lead.
The dependable Lidstrom's scratch due to a lower-body injury came as a surprise to his teammates Sunday morning. He had played in 78 of 82 regular-season games and every playoff game.
"Nick doesn't even miss practices, let alone games," forward Kirk Maltby said. "Unless he's told to stay away from the rink he's there. Hopefully it's not too severe and he'll be back sooner than later. We'll find out more on the flight back or maybe tomorrow.
"If he can't go next game it's up to the guys that dressed to do what we did tonight and step up. Everyone's got to take a little bit of the load."
Detroit coach Mike Babcock tabbed 47-year-old Chris Chelios to take the place of his captain. Babcock learned Lidstrom would be unavailable for Game 4 while in a cab on the way to the United Center.
"Obviously, he's a pretty good player, as you know," Babcock said of Lidstrom. "Without Pav, without Drapes, without (Tomas Kopecky), you start saying to yourself, 'Oh.'
"I really felt our team was going to dig in. I thought (Henrik) Zetterberg had great leadership. I thought (Marian) Hossa had an unbelievable game. Back end was solid. Lot of good goaltending. A lot of poise and urgency early, and they (Hawks) never really got going."
Chelios said he was at the team hotel at 9:45 a.m. when he learned via text from the team trainer Lidstrom wouldn't play. "I thought he was joking," Chelios said, "but then I saw Nick and he told me he wasn't playing."
Chelios saw the ice for just four minutes, 37 seconds while defensemen Brad Stuart (26:38), Niklas Kronwall (23:16), Jonathan Ericsson (23:15) and Brian Rafalski (23:14) played the bulk of the minutes.
"Guys like me and Kronner and Stu-y, Raffy, guys like that, have to step up their game," Chelios said. "It's a lot more ice time for them. Someone else has to take 25 minutes of Nick's ice time."
Detroit outshot Chicago 33-28 and limited quality chances for the Blackhawks against goaltender Chris Osgood.
"I think a lot of it had to do with the willingness to compete out there for each other," Kronwall said. "We did a great job of coming together as a unit of 20-some guys. Everyone did their part and stuck together the whole time, and we were able to come out with the win. That's the most important part of the whole thing."