The Detroit Red Wings were out-shot 11-8 over the course of the 3rd period in last night’s 2-1 loss to the Colorado Avalanche, with the vast majority of the Wings’ 8 shots coming during the game’s final 2 frantic minutes of play.
As Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff notes, the Avs’ relentless play during the 3rd period “taught the Wings a lesson” as to how to play with a lead:
Carrying a 2-1 lead into the third period, it was easy to decipher why Colorado is now 10-0 this season when leading after two periods. Instead of sitting back and sitting on their one-goal advantage, from the drop of the puck to start the final period of regulation, the Avs got after the Red Wings.
They were playing aggressively, attacking Detroit. It was a formula that wound up pinning the Wings in their own zone, wearing them down and winning shift after shift in closing out their 2-1 victory.
“They just won some shifts and they got some zone time,” Detroit coach Derek Lalonde said.
Detroit’s first shot on goal in the third period was by Alex DeBrincat at the 6:30 mark. The Wings wouldn’t register another until there was 2:31 left in the frame and they’d pulled goalie Ville Husso for an extra attacker.
“I think it’s something that we can learn from, what they did in the third,” Red Wings center JT Compher said. “It’s a close game, they’re only up a goal. They stayed aggressive on us and we didn’t execute well enough to get out of our zone quickly, and then they kind of get the momentum of rolling lines over on us, and we weren’t able to flip that fast enough.”
Continued; it was frustrating to watch the Wings come out and play so flat for the early part of the 3rd period, so it wasn’t simply the Avs imposing their will against the Red Wings…
But the Red Wings were also out-played and out-worked not only for the majority of the 3rd period, but also for the majority of the 60-minutes worth of play during last night’s game.
Detroit’s been out-worked for long stretches by the Devils, Canucks, Bruins, Senators and now the Avalanche, and that’s not acceptable. At least the team is admitting that it’s frustrated with its own play instead of continuing obliviously forward.
How so? MLive’s Ansar Khan took note of the other comments that the Red Wings made after last night’s game…
“Obviously very frustrating,” Moritz Seider said. “Once again, you do a lot of good things, but not over a span of 60 minutes. And that will cost you against a really good team. With came out in the third with not nearly as enough jump as we had before. Couldn’t really sustain any kind of O-zone time, get really any kind of dangerous chances, didn’t really force them into uncomfortable situations. In the end then we had a couple good chances, but obviously that’s not good enough.”
But Khan also found that the Red Wings are trying to accentuate the positive as they face perhaps the most difficult point of their 2024-2025 campaign thus far:
“What’s unique is the care in this group’s pretty darn good,” Lalonde said. “I think you can see that with we’re still competing. And I see (J.T. Compher’s) frustration after a game. I see (Michael Rasmussen’s) frustration after a game and they’re putting on themselves for that play they finished or they didn’t. … But if guys just keep at it again, continue to have those type of looks and hopefully it’ll go in.”
Compher stressed the need to “stick together.”
“A lot of frustrated guys in the room and it’s got to be our group of guys to find our way out of it and it’s there for the taking,” Compher said. “A lot of games, it’s right there.”
Seider lamented losing so many 50-50 type games.
“We’re losing games that are winnable, and we just can’t find ways to get it done,” Seider said. “Obviously, that’s really frustrating, and we shouldn’t be lying to ourselves. That shouldn’t drag us down, though. We come to the rink with a big smile tomorrow, get ready to work, play two opponents that are really close (at Buffalo Monday, at Philadelphia Thursday), and hopefully get four points and get back with a little bit of swagger.”
