Detroit at Nashville - Game One Scoring Chances

Off to a slow start with posting these, but I've been counting scoring chances for the series between Nashville and Detroit. The script isn't working real well for individual charts at the moment so I haven't included those below, but they are correct on the larger charts, so that's what you'll find after the jump.

The Game:

Some Thoughts:

I didn't include Nashville's first goal as a scoring chance since it was shot from a bad angle and bounced in off Brad Stuart's skate. That said, the Predators certainly deserved the lead after the first period given that the Wings didn't get a single scoring chance.

The Red Wings came back to tie the game in the second, but Nashville scored to take the lead back on the only five-on-five scoring chance that happened while the game was tied, and they then nursed that lead all the way to the end. The Wings pushed hard in the third period, but couldn't tie it.

In terms of match-ups, the Predators had the last change and used it to get Shea Weber and Ryan Suter out against the line of Pavel Datsyuk, Johan Franzen, and Todd Bertuzzi. They also got to deal with Mike Fisher, Martin Erat, and Sergei Kostitsyn up front, but the difference between that group and the Preds' second line isn't substantial. Datsyuk was still quite good, going +5 -4 during five-on-five action, though with most of the offense coming in the third period as the Wings tried to come back (+4 -0).

With the two big defenders playing together, Henrik Zetterberg was generally getting some softer match-ups defensively. He wasn't able to take advantage, going just +1 -3 during five-on-five play, thanks in large part to the work of Roman Josi and Kevin Klein. The end of the game, however, featured Zetterberg and Weber with Shea Weber slamming Zetterberg's head into the glass. That the play didn't result in a suspension is, as many have already said, absolutely ludicrous. That (lack of) response from the league has very probably led to a lot of the violence we've seen so far in this year's playoffs. Just plain terrible decision-making by the governors, Brendan Shanahan, and the on-ice officials.