After losing three straight on the road, the Red Wings have bounced back hard. Ending their losing streak by defeating Western powerhouse San Jose, the Red Wings continued to reaffirm they are team to be reckoned with by defeating another conference giant in the Dallas Stars 4-3.

Captain Niklas Lidstrom recorded his first two goals of the season, and Jiri Hudler and Pavel Datsyuk also scored to help the Wings to the win over Dallas. Goalie Dominik Hasek stopped 17 shots on the night, while counterpart Marty Turco saved 29 of the 33 he faced. The Detroit victory was Dallas' first home loss of the season. Certainly a punctuation mark that the Wings aren't done, and are perhaps beginning to round into form, like many of the other teams that got off to a bad start.

Quick Shave:
I think I figured out part of the problem in Columbus. The Columbus Blue Jackets take a lot of really bad penalties, and seem to give away 5-3 powerplays to their opponents like it's 'dozen egg night' at Beers Stadium. Luckily for the Blue Jackets, the L.A. Kings were unable to capitalize on any of their power play opportunities in large part due to the amazing goaltending of Pascal Leclaire. Leclaire stopped all 38 shots he faced last night. The Minnesota Wild's latest victim was the Anaheim Ducks whom they defeated 3-2 by way of shootout last night. Brian Rolston is a scoring machine this season, potting his 9th of the season, and helping the Wild remain undefeated on home ice. The fun part about watching the Wild is how they generate their offence. The team often starts by collecting a turnover in their own end, and a wall of green jersey's then rush the ice. They seem to swarm their opponents, and don't really look like the typical Jacque Lemaire trapping team anymore. Olaf Kolzig stopped 42 shots last night but it still wasn't enough to help the Washington Capitals defeat the Vancouver Canucks last night. Vancouver beat the Caps 3-2 in the shootout. Kolzig has been impressive this season, almost always facing over 30 shots a game....and in many cases 40+. Sergei Samsonov.....oh boy. A week after I dropped him from my fantasy lineup, the Habs followed suit, by demoting the thus far useless free agent acquisition to the fourth line. It appears he may soon be seeking a trade.....but who'd be willing to pony the salary cap room for him? Yanic Perrault may be close to rejoining the NHL. Three teams have expressed interest in the face-off specialist.

Game of the Night:
Pittsburgh at Philadelphia 7:00 PM
Nashville at Calgary 10:00 PM

I love watching the Penguins, and if you haven't seen them yet, now's the time. This is the team of the future, but they are playing like that future is now. Philadelphia, which got spanked by the Pens in their first meeting 4-0, are still listing, but showed some signs of life against the Thrashers a few nights ago in capturing their second win. Crosby has owned the Flyers in his young career, so look for him to light them up tonight, along side his new linemate Evgeni Malkin. The Preds / Flames game looks like it could be fun on paper, and because it's a late game, you should have little excuse not to watch both GOTN's! Enjoy the games my bearded friends!

Your friend on ice,
Captain Bosh