The now-13-15-and-4 Detroit Red Wings plain old got out-worked over the course of a 4-3 loss to the Montreal Canadiens on Friday night, and as the Wings head to Montreal for Saturday’s rematch (7 PM on FanDuel Sportsnet Extra/NHL Network/Sportsnet East/TVA Sports/97.1 FM), the Wings need to rededicate themselves to busting their butts better than their opponents do, and the Wings need to work on detail work, too.
Why? They now only lead the 13-16-and-3 Canadiens by 1 point in the Atlantic Division standings.
Saturday is essentially a must-win, and with 2 more games in the next 3 nights (Detroit wraps up its pre-Christmas schedule with a home game against St. Louis on Monday night), the Wings are going to have a hell of a character test here.
The good news, as you’ll find out below, is that the Wings are pissed off at themselves for blowing this game; the test will be whether they can do something about that.
As the Canadiens’ press corps didn’t travel to Detroit en masse (save the French press corps, whose recaps were sparse–I looked), we’re going to have to lean on NHL.com’s Dave Hogg’s recap for an English-language set of takes from the Canadiens’ players and coach:
Patrik Laine scored a go-ahead goal with 7:58 to play and the Montreal Canadiens held on to defeat the Detroit Red Wings 4-3 at Little Caesars Arena on Friday. Emil Heineman and Jake Evans each had a goal and an assist for the Canadiens (13-16-3), who had 33 shots – the first time this season they have gotten more than 30.
“I don’t think we were particularly aiming to get more than 30, but we definitely want to get more chances,” Evans said. “It’s a good sign when you are getting 30 shots, though.”
Sam Montembeault made 25 saves.
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“I don’t think anyone was worried when we went down there,” Canadiens defenseman Kaiden Guhle said. “We were all over (Talbot) and we were playing really well.”
Arber Xhekaj made it 3-3 at 8:42, scoring his first goal of the season with a wrist shot from the left circle. Laine gave Montreal a 4-3 lead with a power-play goal at 12:02, firing a slap shot through the shaft of Moritz Seider’s stick and past Talbot.
“I would not want to have to block his shot,” Evans said. “It looks so effortless and then it does that.”
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Alexandre Carrier played 18:37 in his Canadiens debut, including 3:10 on the penalty kill, one day after being acquired from the Nashville Predators for Justin Barron.
“He was just so good tonight,” said Guhle, his defensive partner. “I didn’t know that much about him, but he’s a really good skater and he makes quick plays with the puck. Obviously, he has to get used to our system stuff, but it is fun to play with him.”
For the Red Wings, Friday’s game was about missed opportunities and playing “too casual,” as captain Dylan Larkin told the Hockey News’s Sam Stockton…
For the Detroit Red Wings, the difference in Friday night’s game against the Montreal Canadiens was a cruel one: a would-be shot block from Moritz Seider turned into the game-winning goal for Patrik Laine by virtue of shattered graphite, Seider’s stick splintering and the puck deflecting past Cam Talbot to give the Canadiens a 4–3 advantage that would hold for the remaining seven minutes and 58 seconds of the game. Cruel though the deflection was, its significance and its sting came from the opportunities the Red Wings didn’t take in the 52 minutes preceding it and the eight that followed.
“It’s a bounce, and it went their way. I think leading up to that point we get the lead and then we just get a little casual,” said captain Dylan Larkin of Laine’s winner, before projecting his focus forward to the second leg of the two sides’ home-and-home tomorrow night in Montreal. “It’s just a couple plays that didn’t go our way and tomorrow night we need to create bounces for ourselves. And that’s getting bodies to the net…just simple hockey and creating good bounces for yourself.”
Friday’s game afforded Detroit the chance to build upon the momentum of three wins in its preceding four games, playing on home ice against the rare Atlantic Division foe it ought to be able to out-match. Instead, puck management and special teams sapped command from the home team all night, and the Red Wings must rebuild their confidence anew tomorrow night on the road.
“We gotta be better with the puck. The margin of error’s not there,” said coach Derek Lalonde of his team’s performance. “We can’t have lapses in our game. We’ve got to be good on special teams. And obviously tonight, we were not.”
The Canadiens scored twice in the first period, and each goal emerged directly from a counterattack sparked by a Detroit turnover. As Larkin pointed out, his somber voice expressing a clarity born of the frustration of familiar mishaps, “When you look at the goals they scored, there’s some key breakdowns, and a lot of it we talk about—about breaking the puck out well and coming back to the house and stopping and puck management.”
As Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff noted, the Canadiens were able to battle back in no small part because the Canadiens played until the whistle blew, while the Red Wings seemed easily distracted…
On the tying goal, the first of the campaign for Canadiens tough guy Arber Xhekaj, Detroit forward Patrick Kane felt it more important to get a little selfish payback on Montreal’s Jake Evans as the Canadiens were breaking the puck out and heading toward the Detroit end of the ice.
While Kane lay on the ice punching Evans in the head 200 feet from his own team’s net, the Canadiens were en route to tying the game. If you watch the replay of the goal, you can see Kane scampering back into the Detroit as Montreal players are already celebrating Xhekaj’s tally.
The winning goal came on a Montreal power play. Detroit defenseman Moritz Seider put his stick out to try and block a Patrik Laine one timer. Instead, Laine’s shot splintered Seider’s stick in half. The resulting change of direction enabled the puck to elude Detroit goalie Cam Talbot.
“We get the lead and then we just get a little casual and we take a penalty,” Detroit captain Dylan Larkin said. “We allowed kind of another fluky play where Kaner and the guy (Evans) go down in the corner and then the puck gets out to the defenseman all alone and he’s walking down.”
Detroit also knew that it lost the special teams battle, surrendering both a power play and shorthanded goal to Montreal, while going 0-for-4 on their own power play, as they told the Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan:
“We had chances but we didn’t keep enough (pucks) out, and they get the power play in the third and score and we get ours and we don’t,” captain Dylan Larkin said. “It would have been real nice to score on that one (late in the period) and tie the game up and get it into overtime and score another one.”
The Canadiens added a shorthanded goal earlier in the game, dominating the special teams part of this game.
“Huge part of it,” said coach Derek Lalonde of the importance Friday of special teams. “An 0-fer on the power play and they scored shorthanded, and they scored on the power play in the end. It was a huge part of the game, our inability to execute on special teams. We have to be better with the puck. The margin for error is not there. We can’t have lapses in our game and we have to be good on special teams and obviously tonight, we were not.”
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“A lot of it was breakdowns,” said Rasmussen of letting the third period lead disappear. “We weren’t on our heels like we had been in previous games maybe when we had the lead. We could have took better care of the puck. Just breakdowns.”
Patrick Kane scored for the second consecutive game, after enduring a 10-game drought. He opened the Wings’ scoring midway in the first period, tying the game 1-1, somehow finding a sliver of room above the right shoulder of Montembeault.
“He’s (Kane) been all over the puck,” Larkin said. “He’s elevated it and raised his compete and it’s great to see. He’s found a way to get himself out of it. I have to start to follow that lead and start playing with that jam that he’s been playing with and kind of force himself into the game and sticking with it.”
The Wings didn’t get a great performance from goaltender Cam Talbot, but they weren’t shouldering blame on their goalie…
“He made some nice saves, controlled his rebounds well,” Lalonde said. “(But) with rhythm and him being comfortable, it probably eliminates two of those goals fairly easily. But coming off injury, it’s all part of it and there will be some rust.”
And the Wings emphasized the absolute need to earn some vengeance on Saturday night, for their own sake:
“We get to see these guys again and a quick turnaround,” Larkin said. “We have to capitalize on our chances and play with a little more intensity and minimize our mistakes. The goals they scored, there were some key breakdowns.”
Coach Lalonde agreed, as he told DetroitRedWings.com’s Jonathan Mills:
“We have a chance to get some momentum before going on [holiday] break, but we have to be better tomorrow,” Red Wings head coach Derek Lalonde said. “I can see why they’re a really good team at home. Their bottom-six is a really good bottom-six, and you can see when they dictate some matchups. They’re a really good team. We’re going to have to be better tomorrow. We’re going to have to bring our best.”
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Lalonde on if he felt his players were a little too casual at times
“Yeah. Probably some puck play early on, manage it. We’ve got to be better with the puck. The margin of error’s not there. We can’t have lapses in our game. We have to be good on special teams, and obviously tonight we were not.”
Lalonde on seeking traction
‘We were sitting here—two games in a row. Great opportunity, three of our last four. Forty minutes didn’t feel like we had our best, but it was still there for the taking, and we get that third goal, and then we just had that mishap to give up the tying, and then, obviously, special teams was the difference in the end.”
Larkin on not letting Laine’s power-play goal frustrate them
“It’s a bounce. It went their way. I think leading up to that point, we get the lead and we just get a little casual. We take a penalty and we allowed another fluky play where Kaner and the guy go down in the corner, then the puck gets out to the defensemen and he’s walking down all alone. It’s just a couple plays that didn’t go our way.”
Sometimes it’s like that. Saturday night will be the Red Wings’ opportunity to respond and rebound.
Multimedia:
Highlights: NHL.com posted a 10:16 highlight clip:
Sportsnet posted a 10:15 highlight clip:
Post-game: The Canadiens’ website posted Kaiden Guhle, Jake Evans, Alexandre Carrier and coach Martin St. Louis‘ post-game comments;
The Red Wings posted a clip of Michael Rasmussen, Dylan Larkin and coach Derek Lalonde speaking with the media:
The Free Press’s Helene St. James posted a 4:07 clip of Rasmussen, Larkin and Lalonde’s comments:
Photos: Field Level Media posted a 45-image gallery;
The Free Press posted a 12-image gallery;
The Detroit News posted a 16-image gallery.
Statistics: Here are the Game Summary and Event Summary:
