Red Wings Seek Redemption in High-Stakes Black Friday Clash
So here’s what’s going on right now with the Detroit Red Wings and the Tampa Bay Lightning, and it’s setting up to be a pretty intense Black Friday matchup. Detroit is still trying to shake off the sting of that rough 6–3 loss to the Nashville Predators earlier in the week—a loss that really shouldn’t have happened against a last-place team. That defeat stretched Detroit’s slump to just five wins in their last 13 games, so momentum has definitely been hard to come by.
And now, staring them down on home ice, is a Tampa Bay team that’s absolutely buzzing. The Lightning have rolled into Detroit on a five-game win streak and are sitting on top of the Atlantic Division again. A Red Wings win today would tighten that gap to a single point, so there’s real weight behind this one.
Head coach Todd McLellan has been trying to spark something by shaking up the bottom six. Some lines that looked solid a few weeks ago just haven’t clicked recently, so the blender has definitely been out. Marco Kasper is being bumped back into the top six, joining Alex DeBrincat and the red-hot James van Riemsdyk, who’s been scoring like he found a new gear. Rookie Nate Danielson is being put in a tough but interesting spot—centering Patrick Kane and Andrew Copp, two veterans searching for a little more consistency.
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On the fourth line, things will look especially fresh. Michael Rasmussen returns from injury and will skate with J.T. Compher—finally back after an illness—and Mason Appleton. Meanwhile, Detroit’s main trio of Lucas Raymond, DeBrincat, and captain Dylan Larkin continues to carry much of the load, producing steady offense even when the rest of the team has cooled off.
Defensively, not much changes aside from a welcome return: Simon Edvinsson is back after missing a few games with that illness going around the team. He rejoins Moritz Seider, and the rest of the blue-line group stays mostly familiar.
On Tampa Bay’s side, the strategy has been about spreading out the firepower. Jake Guentzel and Nikita Kucherov—two elite scoring threats—have been separated to form multiple dangerous lines. And lately, their depth guys like Zemgus Girgensons and Oliver Bjorkstrand have stepped up at big moments. Detroit will especially need to keep an eye on Kucherov, who seems to show up every single time he plays the Wings.
In net, Detroit is turning back to John Gibson, while Tampa rolls out Andrei Vasilevskiy—one of the best goalies of this generation and someone who has historically posted strong numbers against Detroit.
So, with stakes high, streaks on the line, and lineups shaken up on both sides, this matchup is shaping up to be one of the most intriguing games of Detroit’s homestand.
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