One of the best teams in the league got some bad news yesterday, while one of the worst teams had a pleasant surprise. On the negative side of things, Detroit's workhorse goalie Jimmy Howard will be out two weeks with a broken finger. On the positive side, Edmonton's Sam Gagner scored a whopping eight points against Chicago last night.
The Wings picked up the win in a shootout against Vancouver, but losing Howard will hurt them. Howard has played in 44 games this season, and he's posted a .924 save percentage in those games, truly earning his place in last weekend's All-Star Game. Two weeks isn't that long of a time, but Ty Conklin has been awful in his limited work this season, as he has a .886 SV% in 10 appearances. Detroit is going to find it much more difficult to win with him in net.
If Howard is out two weeks, he will miss six games. The Wings do play Edmonton twice and Anaheim once in that time, but it still doesn't bode well for Detroit, who are in a tough battle for the Central Division. One bad week could be the difference between leading the division and being in fourth, meaning, at best, the sixth seed out West.
Speaking of the Oilers, Sam Gagner hasn't been having a terribly good season. He only had five goals and 22 points in 43 games. Guys like Jordan Eberle, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, and Taylor Hall are all better, more important players. However, Thursday's game ended up being all about Gagner.
The Oilers were down 2-0 early in the second period before they finally got their first goal of the game, with an assist from Gagner. Gagner then scored his first goal of the game to tie things up. Eventually, he would add three more goals and three more assists. Edmonton won 8-4, and Gagner had a hand in every single tally.
This was the first eight point game in the NHL since December 31, 1988, when Mario Lemieux did it. Gagner tied the Edmonton team record, a record he shares with Wayne Gretzky and Paul Coffey, and he fell two points shy of Darryl Sittler's record. It was only the 14th 10 eight point game in NHL history.
Obviously, any eight point game is a bit of a fluke, but for Gagner it seems even more unlikely. I don't have a list of all the eight point games in front of me, but the names I have seen are all much better players than Gagner. Still, a great night for him, even if it is merely a fluke. He's still only 22, and he has plenty of time to improve, but he'll never have a better game than this.
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