Of Red Wings-related note this morning, after the Red Wings’ 6-3 loss to the San Jose Sharks on Tuesday night:
- The Free Press’s Helene St. James discusses Wings coach Todd McLellan’s blunt assessments of his team’s performance, both collectively and individually speaking, last night:
Todd McLellan didn’t cushion his opinion after watching the Detroit Red Wings lose for the first time in eight games.
The Wings (20-19-4) head on their first extended road trip under McLellan tarnished by a 6-3 loss to the San Jose Sharks that basically reinforced McLellan’s concerns from the previous game.
“I thought the third period against Seattle the other day showed up,” McLellan said Tuesday. “We were sloppy in that third, we gave up quite a bit. We started the game that way – we didn’t break pucks out very well and when we did enter the offensive zone, not a lot went to the net.
“So a disappointing night for our group. New experience for us in our few weeks here. I’m anxious to see — do we carry this with us, or do we respond? If we respond and we do the proper things, I don’t know if we’ll win or lose, but we’ll give ourselves a chance and if we don’t, then we have a lot of work to do. I’m excited about seeing that.”
The Wings fell behind 2-0, 4-2 and 5-3. Every time they edged within a goal, the Sharks came right back and increased it to two. Most egregiously, Lucas Raymond had just pulled the Wings within 4-3 when Justin Holl turned the puck over right outside his own crease and the Sharks took advantage. Holl didn’t play the rest of the period.
“He sent himself a message,” McLellan said. “I think that’s pretty obvious. I’m not going to sit here and BS for him — he had a terrible night. That’s just the way it is. Whether he got on in the last five minutes or not, it really doesn’t matter. He knows he can play better. I am going to tell him that. I know he is a better player than that.”
2. MLive’s Ansar Khan addresses the same topic…
The Red Wings’ seven-game winning streak, their longest in 13 years, was snapped. They fell to 7-2-0 under McLellan, who could see this performance coming following a poor third period in Sunday’s 6-2 victory over Seattle. After that game, McLellan lamented having a mandatory day off Monday, saying they needed to work on some things.
“They’re on the bench and they’re watching things happen, and they can hear coaches barking and they’re saying the same thing,” McLellan said. “And then the next group goes out and does the exact same, behaves the exact same way. That tells me they weren’t sharp, they weren’t alert, they weren’t prepared to adjust. We tried to fix a few things this morning, but obviously we’ve got work to do.”
Moritz Seider said, “We over-complicated the game in the first period and then just chased the game a little bit.
“Overall, I think we shouldn’t be that concerned,” Seider said. “I know we are a good team. We’ll shake it off. We’ll go to work tomorrow and practice and make sure we’ll tighten things up and get ready for a good road trip.”
The Red Wings start a tough four-game trip Thursday in Florida (7 p.m., ESPN) that includes stops in Tampa Bay, Dallas and Philadelphia, all places where Detroit has had difficulty winning in recent years.
“We’ll have a good skate tomorrow, and then I’m anxious to see how we do,” McLellan said. “Do we carry this with us or do we respond and do the proper things? I don’t know if we’ll win or lose, but we’ll give ourselves a chance. And if we don’t, then we got a lot of work to do.”
3. As does the Hockey News’s Sam Stockton…
When the third period began, the Red Wings appeared primed for a comeback, backed by a Little Caesars Arena crowd that remained boisterous despite the score favoring the visitors. Instead, William Eklund scored 26 seconds into the third to make it 3–1 San Jose. Twice over the 19:34 that remained, Detroit scored to pull within a goal, and twice the Sharks responded within two minutes to restore their two-goal cushion, before Mario Ferraro buried an empty-netter with 1:38 remaining and the winning streak was history.
In net, Ville Husso—making his first NHL start since Dec. 14—did not show the best of his game in an 18-save performance, with Jan Rutta’s opening goal particularly lamentable, but as McLellan said post-game, the defeat hardly fell on his shoulders: “He probably has to find a way to make one of those saves…but if you or anybody in here thinks that game is on the goaltending, it sure wasn’t.”
4. Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff took note of Vladimir Tarasenko’s offensive output of late, which was highlighted by a 2-goal performance last night…
“There’s a lot of negativity around the game,” Detroit coach Todd McLellan was admitting. “The positive is that Vladdy got on the score sheet.
“And when you look at the type of shots he took, how quick he got that shot off, that pace of release was instant. And I think there’s more of that. That’s how I remember Vladdy scoring. It’s not a long load and a slow release. He gets it off quick. And I’m excited about the fact that he found the score sheet with that type of shot.”
Even so, it’s still had to raise any exictement level where Tarasenko is concerned. Even taking into account his two-goal outburst, the two-time 40-goal scorer still is only showing six goals on his ledger this season.
Those were his first goals since Dec. 1. That’s a 18-game goalless span.
Perhaps, though, there is a glimmer of hope for Tarasenko. His two-goal game follows a two-assist display in Detroit’s previous game against the Seattle Kraken.
That’s four points in two games. It took him 18 games to accumulate his previous four points.
5. And the Free Press’s Carlos Monarrez offered this about coach McLellan’s remarks:
The thing about coaches in any sport, is that no one loves a retread, which is what McLellan is. Everyone wants to find the diamond in the rough. Everyone wants to hire Dan Campbell so they can prove their genius.
But there’s no formula for any of it. The Wings were eventually going to lose and now that they have, they might lose again very quickly when they embark on a four-game trip in six days against three good teams.
McLellan expects to learn about his team during the trip and how they respond to Tuesday’s loss after they played “almost like we were entitled to win.”
It’s probably unpopular to suggest this, but Yzerman deserves some credit not only for curbing his patience and firing Derek Lalonde, but also for hiring McLellan and assistant Trent Yawney and staying out of their way.
“He wanted us to formulate some of our own opinions about players,” McLellan said. “I think he values that. He didn’t come in guns a-blazing and say, ‘Hey, this player plays this way or that way,’ or anything like that. He and I have had a pretty good relationship for a long time. So we’ve had some real, honest and frank discussions about the team and the direction, and I appreciate that.”
Then Yzerman did something crucial that made a big difference and might have led to all this sudden success.
“Then he backed,” McLellan said, “and said, ‘You guys figure it out. See what you know, see what you come up with. Formulate your own opinions.’ So to this point, it’s been a good transition.”
