If Chris Chelios awoke Wednesday morning in Detroit and read The Detroit News with his coffee, the caffeine wasn`t all that jolted him awake. The Hawks defenseman was being complimented by the opposition-with a backhanded slap.
”I watched him out there,” said Red Wings defenseman Gord Kruppke of Tuesday`s 3-2 loss to the Hawks. ”It`s good to see how a guy like Chelios plays. He`s a dirty player. But he`s sneaky.
”It`s a talent to do the things he does and still get away with it. There`s a big difference between going out and giving a guy a cheap shot every now and then and going out and being sneaky like he does.”
– Michel Goulet has been stung by being scratched from the lineup several times. So even scoring the winning goal Tuesday can`t completely clear his mind of his previous trials.
You can hear the pain between the lines if you listen closely.
”I`m always positive,” he said. ”I`m ready every time I put on the uniform . . . even though I didn`t play some games this year.”
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– Darryl Sutter had a premonition his Hawks would play well in Detroit. It started when he was driven to Joe Louis Arena Tuesday night by a bus driver who used to drive the Hawks` minor-league team in Saginaw, Mich., where Sutter started his coaching career in 1988-89.
”A bus convention was in Detroit,” Sutter said, ”so he wanted to drop me off. I knew it`d be a good night after that.”
– Ed Belfour and Dino Ciccarelli have the same agent, Ron Salcer. But that hasn`t made them close friends, as you could tell from their jabbering at each other Tuesday.
”He`s always in the crease bugging me,” Belfour said. ”Just because we have the same agent, well, it doesn`t work that way.”
Belfour also insisted that Bob Probert`s intimidating him only help pump him up more. ”He always tries to run me over, but that just gets me going and gets me more into the game.”