“F’ing Sameulsson!”

Twenty-two thousand miles away I could hear the yelping.

“Sameulsson get the [editor's cut] out of the way.”

I didn’t have to hear him.  I knew my Brother-in-law was screaming at the television.  Mikael had just blocked Brett Lebda’s shot (His own team!).  He hates Sameulsson. Every time the Swede touches the puck his blood begins a slight boil, his cheeks become red and curse words creep to the tip of his tongue.

From my couch I pictured his large hand tightening its death grip on his glass beverage cup.  As Sameulsson wheels around with the puck he’d foolishly gotten in front of (What was he doing standing in the slot 15 feet from the net??? He always gets lost on the ice!) my brother-in-law’s hand squeezes harder, straining the glass; the etched Red Wing logo about to spring a leak.

Sameulsson whirls to the right faceoff circle and fires a shot that sails over the Khabibulin Wall.

GGGOOOOAAAALLLLLLLL!!!!

The hate briefly melts away, like the snow pile during a quick December thawing.

“Don’t you hate Sameulsson?” I immediately text.

“Yes, but not today,” instantly came the reply.

In the world of ‘what have you done for me lately’  Mikael scored big.  His rising shot proved to be the game winner.

The Drones at work

Sunday’s 5-2 thrashing of the Blackhawks exemplified just why the Red Wings have dominated hockey for the better part of two decades.

Four pucks beat Nikolai Khabibulin, none of them off sticks of All-Stars.

The Red Wings have been called “The Yankees of hockey” as they bought future Hall of Famers like poor people buy canned food, in bulk.  This correlation has lost steam with the employment of the salary cap. (Do you think the Yankees would be any good at all if baseball had a salary cap? No, me neither) However the Wings haven’t lost any steam as far as winning is concerned.

The Wings’ Stanley Cup victories both pre and post salary cap have come on the backs of the hard works, the grinders and ironically enough a guy nicknamed The Mule.

Kris Draper, Kirk Maltby, Darren McCarty, Dallas Drake, et al.  These players were the fuel that propelled the Detroit motor to four Cups in twelve years.  Even in years when they failed to drink from Lord Stanley’s chalice, these work horses kept the Wings atop the league.

So it was no surprise when hard-nosed Dan Cleary scored two goals in Sunday’s game.  Why shouldn’t a hard working forward who reinvented himself as a Wing lead the way in the first game of the Western Conference finals?

His first goal was a bullet from the left side that beat Khabibulin in the only place you will normally beat Khabibulin, up high.  His second goal, which gave Detroit a two-goal cushion, was a deflection over Khabibulin’s shoulder.

The multitude of European players that fills the Red Wings roster give the team a sort of aloofish feel.  They are the finesse players.  Sameulsson fits neatly into that mold.  This is why my Brother-in-law can’t stand him.  He’s not like Cleary or Draper, or even the new Draper (Darren Helm).  He’s closer to that girl you date who drives you absolutely crazy–and not the good kind.  But then there are those certain days when you remember ‘oh that’s why I’m with her.’  Sunday was that day.

So while Pavel Datsyuk continues fasting from goal scoring, Hedrik Zetterburg pads his stats with empty net goals and Marian Hossa kneels praying for a rematch in the Finals with his old Penguin team, the worker bees fill up the stat sheet.

It is the diligent work of those drones that carries the team.

Oh, and one Mule, of course.

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Kevin Patra lives by the adage: Those who can’t do, write.  Currently, he is a grad student at the University of Southern California studying Online Journalism, after spending four years at the University of Michigan obtaining a bachelors degree from the school of Language, Science & Fun. Patra considers using the troughs at Joe Louis Arena as one of the most traumatic experience of his childhood.

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