The last time Petr Mrazek wore a Detroit Red Wings jersey to play in a NHL match, it was on February 18, 2018, when he made 31 stops on 34 shots in a defeat of 3 to 2 against the Toronto Maple Leafs. A day later, he was exchanged at the Philadelphia flyers for two recourse choices. The first time arrived five years before that: on February 7, 2013, when Mraek made 26 stops to beat the Blues 5-1 during his beginnings in the NHL.
The next time Mrazek will wear the winged wheel and participate in Net for Detroit, it is Wednesday evening against the Buffalo sabers in Little Caesars Arena. Mrazek said on Wednesday morning, he “feels good” to put the sweater from an emblematic winged, adding that because his “first steps in the NHL were here … It was not easy to leave this place”.
Only one player remains the last Mrazek match as the Red Aile the first time: Dylan Larkin, who has been a promising and productive graduate for the captain and the Cornerstone franchise at the age of 28 for 21 years.
Unlike Larkin, the Red Wings as a collective have not started for brighter days since the departure of Mrazek. Trade was an unequivocal marker of reconstruction which has not yet returned to the playoffs. The regime supervising reconstruction has changed, and the programming is much stronger than that which Mrazek left, but the gain over years of choice of draft and perspective has not yet happened.
Instead, Detroit enters Wednesday’s match in desperate, if not disastrous despair. The Red Wings lost six games in a row, the last A 2–1 defeat in Ottawa Monday evening, in which they surpassed the Senators 49-23. Checking the game of the game is a cold comfort while the cutting line of the playoffs slips further away, but at least the loss has provided something positive on which to hang on.
“I thought everything was really good,” said defender Moritz Seuide after Wednesday’s skate. “We did not authorize a goal of five against five. This is obviously something positive. Even the game before, we limited the goals against … (against Ottawa), we went out and played a very good time of travel … If you want to choose one thing (we did well), I think we have stayed mentally the whole game, even if things were not as pretty, and I think it was a good start.”
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Detroit lost against the senses without conceding five against five because of two goals against His penalty in difficulty. By seider, the short -term struggles of the Red Wings have more to do with their own mistakes than the exploits of the opposing power game.
As for what Detroit is looking for when it is in the short term, Seider said: “If the washers bounce around the yellow (at the base of the boards), you want to put pressure like all the other teams. Apart from that, we want to stay in our structure and simply eliminate the danger zones in front of our net. I think that usually we do a nice job (of that). It is only mistaken, what is generally.
For a team that has lost six games in a row but that always lingers on the external scope of the playoff race, the imperative to win every night is obvious. For the Red Wings against Sabers Wednesday evening, this imperative holds, with its own unique touch in the form of the upcoming calendar.
As nhl.com Nick Cottesika stressed Wednesday morning on Twitter, Wednesday’s match is the last match that Detroit will play this season against a club currently below the ranking. With real candidates for the Cup in Caroline, Vegas and Washington, in the most difficult calendar in the League to close the season, the need of the Red Wings to take two points against the Sabers (last of the Eastern Conference) is only growing.
The Red Wings will drive with the same programming on Monday evening in Ottawa as they seek to make their way, with Mrazek taking charge of Cam Talbot’s goalkeeper tasks.
Red Wings in the Gear Stadium series before tonight’s game against BUF
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(Lagesson-Petry)It looks like Mrazek in the starter net pic.twitter.com/tthchokawl
– Sam Stockton (@_samstockton) March 12, 2025
This was not an easy 24-25 season for Mrazek (a percentage of stops of 0.890 and 3.46 goals against the average in 33 games by Chicago Blackhawk). Now he is thrown in a place where the Red Wings need him to reward their bet on him for the end of this season and in a hurry.
Before Ottawa’s match on McLellan on McLellan on Monday rejected the concept of “essential” on Monday on the grounds that any team approaches each game with this state of mind. However, with the defeats’ sequence ball and the strength of the upcoming calendar, Wednesday evening clearly represents a game where a strong performance will not be sufficient. All that matters is the result. And to obtain this result, McLellan and his team will count on Mrazek, in his return to Hockeytown, to set the tone of the net.
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