When it comes to measuring stick games, the Blue Jackets have fared well this season.
Columbus has 16 victories this year, and 10 of them have been against teams that made it to the Stanley Cup Playoffs a season ago. The latest came New Year’s Eve, as the Blue Jackets won a 4-3 shootout final over a team that’s made the postseason six straight years and won three of the last four Metropolitan Division titles.
Perhaps more important was the way the Blue Jackets did it. Carolina led 3-2 going into the third period, but the Blue Jackets played their best hockey in the final frame, equalized the score and earned just their second victory when trailing after two periods this season.
“I hope it’s a wonderful sign, obviously, moving forward,” head coach Dean Evason said. “We’ve handled adversity up to this point, and now you’re going to have to handle a lot more. But to do it against that team, such a good hockey club – Carolina is so good, put so much heat on us. We didn’t handle it in (some) areas, but at the end of the day we got the job done. We’re resilient. We stayed the course, we don’t panic on our bench, and that’s exciting for us.”
The victory moved Columbus to within two points of the final wild card spot in the Eastern Conference as the calendar turns to 2025, and there’s a lot of reasons to like the way the team is playing of late. The Blue Jackets have points in five of the last six games (4-1-1), as the team’s best players like top-line forwards Dmitri Voronkov, Sean Monahan and Kirill Marchenko and top defenseman Zach Werenski have been among the league’s top scorers in that span.
The next step is finding some consistency and perhaps some scoring balance in the lineup, but the most important part might be learning how to win and believing you can go toe-to-toe against the best. The Blue Jackets have made major strides in those categories this season, and they hope they can carry the momentum from the Carolina win into the new year.
“When you win games like this – you come back, you do it on home ice – those are fun, and those are the ones you have to try to build off of,” Monahan said.
Next up is taking on a Detroit team that the Blue Jackets will face March 1 in the Navy Federal Credit Union NHL Stadium Series game in Ohio Stadium. Columbus has been excellent at home, posting a 12-4-3 record and leading the league with 76 goals scored at home (4.00 average).
Know The Foe: Detroit Red Wings
Head coach: Todd McLellan (First season)
Team stats: Goals per game: 2.62 (28th) | Scoring defense: 3.24 (24th) | PP: 24.1 percent (9th) | PK: 69.6 percent (31st)
The narrative: After a historic 25-season streak of making the postseason, the Red Wings have failed to make the Stanley Cup Playoffs eight straight seasons. There were high hopes a young core mixed with veterans would keep that run from reaching nine years, but Detroit has scuffled through most of the season culminating in the firing of head coach Derek Lalonde on Dec. 26. New head man McLellan has skipped the team to two wins in his first three games while trying to bring the fun back to the Motor City.
Team leaders: The Red Wings have a keeper in Lucas Raymond, as the 22-year-old Swede who was taken fourth overall in the 2020 draft scored 31 goals last season and leads the squad with 15 goals and 38 points this year. Captain Dylan Larkin is next with a 13-16-29 line, while dangerous goal scorer Alex DeBrincat ties Raymond with 15 goals among his 28 points. Mortiz Seider leads the defense with 20 points on four goals and 16 assists, but he’s the only other Red Wing with at least 20 points as secondary scoring has been hard to come by.
Cam Talbot has started a team-high 18 games in net and is 6-9-2 with a 2.98 GAA and .906 save percentage. Alex Lyon (7-5-0, 2.83, .899) is the primary backup, while veteran Ville Husso has struggled and spent time in the minors this season.
What's new: McLellan’s tenure started with a loss vs. Toronto, but the Red Wings have won consecutive home games by a 4-2 score over Washington and Pittsburgh. We’ll see the long-term impact of the coaching change, but the Red Wings have a hole to dig out of in the standings as they sit six points out of the final wild card spot in the Eastern Conference.
Trending: Detroit swept the season series a year ago, as Columbus went 0-2-1 and gained its only point in an overtime loss March 19 at Nationwide Arena. The Blue Jackets went 17-5-1 against their northern neighbors from 2017-22 but are 1-4-1 the past two years.
Former CBJ: Tyler Motte has played 22 games for the Red Wings this year, and the wing has two goals on the campaign.
