Blackhawks vs. Red Wings: Betting Odds and Picks

Chicago Blackhawks vs. Detroit Red Wings - Wed May 27 ‘09 7:35 pm
Free Betting NHL Pick: Chicago Blackhawks (200)
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The youthful Blackhawks got a big time dose of reality when they were trounced by the Wings in Game Four on their home ice. Absolutely nothing went right for G Cristobal Huet, who was making his first career playoff start in relief of the injured Khabibulin. He only stopped 21 of his 26 shots faced, which simply isn’t good enough to get the job done against anyone at this level in the postseason.

What's even worse for Quenneville’s squad was that his top offensive players never really got shots on the Detroit net, either. RW Patrick Kane, C Jonathan Toews, and RW Martin Havlat only combined to take five shots for the game, even though Toews did light the lamp with his goal in the second period—Chicago’s lone strike of the game.

Huet has the ability to beat the Red Wings. Just look at his effort from April 11, when he stopped 21 of 23 shots in Chicago’s 4-2 victory in Motown.

As long as Detroit doesn’t get complacent and continues playing like it did in Game Four, this series shouldn’t last much longer.

Stars C Johan Franzen (one goal), RW Marian Hossa (two goals, one assist), and LW Henrik Zetterberg (two goals) finally all came together on the same night, and the result was a six-goal outburst on a young goalie making his first start at this level.

Meanwhile, it was business as usual for G Chris Osgood, who stopped 18 of the 19 shots he faced before being relieved by G Ty Conklin for the final 20 minutes of the game. The 6-1 final score in Game Four looks incredibly lopsided, and an incredibly lopsided game it was. Anything and everything Detroit wanted to accomplish, it did. There’s no doubt who the better team is in this series, but there’s still a big question about the Wings and their killer instinct when they have a team down. They put away Columbus after going up 3-0, but really struggled with Anaheim for an unnecessarily long time. This Chicago club is the stingiest bunch they’ve run into so far in this postseason and won’t go away easily.

Chicago’s spirits are still very high in this series in spite of the bad loss in Game Four. The Blackhawks had every opportunity in the world to steal Game Two of this series a week ago, and have to feel like they let one slip away. The odds weren’t this high on Detroit in that Game Two, and they’ll go on to defend their Stanley Cup title against the Pens—tonight may not be the close out night.

The young Hawks are almost too stupid to realize that they shouldn’t be here, and they’ve defied the odds all season. There’s a ton of value on a Chicago team tonight with absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain.