Red Wings-Canadiens Tweetcap: back-foot blitz, DeBrincat’s savvy yield a gigantic 3-1 win for Detroit

The Detroit Red Wings entered a quartet of “four-point games” by hosting the Montreal Canadiens on Thursday evening.

The Wings play a gauntlet of Atlantic Division foes in Montreal, Boston (Saturday), Ottawa (next Tuesday) and Buffalo (next Friday) with the Red Wings’ playoff fate on the line, and it’s essential that the Wings snag as many points as possible out of this next set of games.

On Thursday night at Little Caesars Arena, the Red Wings did not necessarily have one of their better games, but they won 3-1 over Montreal anyway.

Detroit was out-shot 12-8 in a scoreless 1st period, surrendered a Jaroslav Slafkovsky goal late in the 2nd period, on a wonky power play, but J.T. Compher scored an even-strength marker at 2:14 of the 3rd, Alex DeBrincat scored off a Mike Matheson tumble at 16:35, and DeBrincat earned a 2nd assist and 3rd point of the night on Andrew Copp’s empty-netter at 19:43…

And John Gibson was a STALWART in net, stopping 31 of 32 shots for Detroit.

PREGAME: John Gibson and Jakub Dobes led their respective teams out onto the ice…

The Habs waited until game time to post their lineup as Josh Anderson, Arber Xhekaj and Kirby Dach were all out with injuries, meaning that former Wing Joe Veleno drew back into the lineup…

And Detroit welcomed Andrew Copp back into the lineup, but Michael Brandsegg-Nygard, Michael Rasmussen and captain Dylan Larkin remained sidelined with injuries:

1ST PERIOD:

The Wings and Habs dressed the following starters and lineups:

PENALTIES: James van Riemsdyk got a roughing minor and Kaiden Gulhe got an interference penalty, offsetting, at 9:35 of the 1st period. 4 on 4.

PENALTY: Ben Chiarot got penalized for running Bolduc into John Gibson at 17:39 of the 1st period. “Roughing” was called.

2ND PERIOD:

PENALTY: Alex Carrier was called for holding at 4:13 of the 2nd period.

PENALTY: Lane Hutson was called for an accidental interference minor on Alex DeBrincat at 7:54.

PENALTY: Moritz Seider was called for holding the stick with 2:28 left in the 2nd period/17:32 elapsed.

GOAL: And the Montreal Canadiens opened the scoring as Hutson, Suzuki and Caufield worked the puck down low, John Gibson gave a arebound off Demidov, and Slafkovsky roofed the puck off the crossbar and down into the net at 17:45.

Montreal 1, Detroit 0: Slafkovsky (25) from Caufield (29) and Suzuki (57) at 17:45 2nd period.

INJURY: Moritz Seider accidentally pushed Nick Suzuki into Mason Appleton, and he headed off with 42 seconds remaining in the 2nd period.

3RD PERIOD:

RETURN: Appleton shook off the cobwebs and returned to the game.

GOAL: Patrick Kane fired a very long shot from the right blueline in on Jakub Dobes, and Alex DeBrincat whiffed on the tip, but the puck went off Dobson’s butt and then J.T. Compher to deflect past Dobes and tie the game.

Montreal 1, Detroit 1: Compher (10) from Kane (29) and DeBrincat (37) at 2:12 of the 3rd.

PENALTIES: Moritz Seider and Jayden Struble went for roughing at 3:44, yielding a 4 on 4 situation.

GOAL: With 3:25 remaining in the 3rd period, J.T. Compher and Patrick Kane tipped the puck out to center ice, Mike Matheson fell trying to sweep a rolling puck away from Alex DeBrincat, and DeBrincat scored on Dobes to make it 2-1 Detroit.

Detroit 2, Montreal 1: DeBrincat (34) unassisted at 16:35 of the 3rd.

GOALIE PULL: With 1:52 left in the 3rd, Martin St-Louis pulled Jakub Dobes.

TIMEOUT: Montreal called timeout with 54.4 left in the 3rd.

GOAL: Detroit pushed the puck out of its own zone off a lost faceoff via an Alex DeBrincat push up for Andrew Copp, who deked, dangled and scored on the empty net at 19:43 of the 3rd period.

Montreal 1, Detroit 3: Copp (9) from DeBrincat (38), empty net at 19:43 of the 3rd period.

END OF GAME.

STATISTICS: Here are the Game Summary and Event Summary:

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George Malik

My name is George Malik, and I'm the Malik Report's editor/blogger/poster. I have been blogging about the Red Wings since 2006, and have worked with MLive and Kukla's Korner. Thank you for reading!

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