Detroit City Wire

The Detroit Red Wings are set to begin a five-game road trip in the Western Conference, starting with a rematch against the St. Louis Blues at Enterprise Center on Tuesday night. This game marks the second half of a home-and-home series between the two teams.

Red Wings captain Dylan Larkin emphasized the importance of this stretch for his team. “This is a big road trip,” Larkin said. “It’s great. It’s an exciting road trip…I hope there’s some energy from [fans on the road] with our start. A lot of them show up like they normally do…I hope there’s excitement from our young guys and our group to go out and play on the road on this trip.”

Detroit enters the matchup with a 6-3-0 record and 12 points, while St. Louis holds a 3-5-1 record with 7 points. The game will be broadcast on FanDuel Sports Network Detroit and can be heard locally on 97.1 The Ticket.

Defenseman Moritz Seider sees this extended time away as an opportunity for team building, noting that spending time together can help strengthen chemistry among players. “You’re on top of each other for a bit and it gets tiring by the end, so you’re looking forward to kind of being at home,” Seider said. “Other than that, I think we’ll have a lot of good meals, good conversations, a little bit of time on the plane just playing cards and hopefully just building a little bit more chemistry.”

The Red Wings come into St. Louis after rallying from four goals down to defeat the Blues 6-4 at Little Caesars Arena last Saturday—a comeback achieved only five times in franchise history.

“We’re in every game until it’s over,” Seider said. “We’ve shown that, but we just have to regroup and eliminate the easy mistakes. You can see once we roll, we kind of roll with anyone. That’s definitely something positive.”

Forward Andrew Copp described head coach Todd McLellan's desired style as one focused on speed and aggressive forechecking: “I think that would be what we want our identity to be,” Copp said. “I think from that, we need to move the puck quickly in the offensive zone. We need to move our feet with the puck, but we can’t just be skating because then you’re holding onto it forever and everyone knows where it is. We got to move the puck quickly, play a little give-and-go game down low.”

Coach McLellan addressed reporters about Michael Brandsegg-Nygård's recent assignment to AHL affiliate Grand Rapids Griffins after making his NHL debut earlier this season.

“This was a young man who came in and really stole the exhibition season,” McLellan said. “All the attention was on him, and he played extremely well. Earned every little bit of the start that he had in the NHL. But as the games wore on, they got a little bit faster, as the League always does, and all of a sudden your confidence erodes a little bit… He’s a tremendous young hockey player that’s going to continue to develop down there. He’ll get a chance to rediscover his confidence, more minutes and play in prime-time situations.”

St. Louis comes into Tuesday's contest after losing four straight games; their most recent defeat was against Pittsburgh Penguins by 6-3 at PPG Paints Arena Monday night.

“I think the start off a trip is huge,” Larkin said about setting expectations for Tuesday's game against St.Louis.“So,[on Tuesday]in St.Louis ,especially howthegame wentonSaturdayagainstthem ,they'regoingtobecomingforus .It'sgoingtosetthetoneforthetrip .Ihopewecanbereadytorespondandbereadytogo .”