Blue Jackets Win Goaltenders Duel in Detroit For Seventh Straight

The Columbus Blue Jackets continue their roll and have now won a weeks’ worth of games consecutively, as it was the Jackets who shut out the Red Wings in their building after Detroit did the same thing in November in a defensive standoff between Sergei Bobrovsky and Jimmy Howard. In the end, it’d be Bob and the streaking team who would be victorious, taking this one in a shootout 1-0. Yes, you read that correctly. One. To. Nothing.

Exactly how even was this game? Well, aside from the one-goal differential (which was only there because the Jackets won the shootout 2-1), Bob made 30 saves and Howard stopped 29 shots. Columbus won just three more faceoffs. The Red Wings were credited with one more giveaway but also were credited with two more takeaways. I could go on and on, but I think you get the point.

Full disclosure here – I didn’t watch the entire game. As a matter of fact, I only watched the final five minutes of regulation, the overtime period and the shootout. But, honestly, I feel like that’s all you needed to see, because that’s how I believe the rest of the game went. For a few moments, it’d be the Blue Jackets with a handful of chances, then once the puck was cleared, it’d be Detroit’s turn to have chances. It was a back and forth hockey game throughout, and the only real time one team really pulled away by the eye test was in overtime on the Columbus side of things, in which James Wisniewski, Nick Foligno and Kevin Connauton all had an opportunity to win it before the shootout took place, but Howard was as solid as could be.

In the shootout, it was Ryan Johansen going slow-mo, top shelf once again and Boone Jenner who would score for the Jackets, one better than the Wings’ after Pavel Datsyuk was the lone successful shootout participant for the home team.

Columbus has already tied a club record in terms of a streak (that losing streak, do we really need to talk about it more?) this season, but they’re on the cusp of tying or breaking another one. Their seven game win streak is the second longest in Blue Jackets history, second only to last year’s eight-game streak which lasted from Jan. 6th to Feb. 8th.

Would you like some fun facts about tonight’s game before we depart? Of course you do! Tonight was the 100th shootout in Detroit history and the 99th in Columbus history. It was also the third time in the series history in which a game has ended 1-0; Columbus is now 2-1 all time in 1-0 games against the Red Wings. Finally, this is only the fourth 1-0 shootout game in CBJ history – three of which have come to Detroit.

Now you’re going to be the smartest person in your office tomorrow for knowing all of this stuff! Aren’t you glad you read us? The Jackets are now two games under .500, jumped three teams in the standings and have a day off before facing the Caps again, this time in Nationwide Arena. This is a fun team to watch who were 12 points out of eighth place in the conference come the beginning of the month, eh?