Looking to get back into the win column, and find some offense in the process, the Wings headed to Philly. Ah yes, the city of Brotherly Love, cheesesteaks, and an active curse on the Wings that’s seen them take 1 road win since at least the 90s. No pressure.
Game Summary
Look, this is going to be a little bit of a different recap from my normal style. It was a 1-0 game, with the only tally coming in the 1st period. Games like this don’t exactly lend themselves to period-by-period breakdowns.
That said, that lone goal was a doozy. In his first game back from injury, Compher was all over his defensive assignment when the Flyers tried to sneak a pass in anyway. Just behind Lyon, Compher got a stick on the puck before his man does but couldn’t get it cleanly. The puck deflected just over Lyon, and that’s all she wrote. Ugh.
Speaking of Lyon, he went out in the second with some sort of injury. No official word on it yet, but hopefully it’s something minor. Forgiving the most recent Ottawa loss (we were down like 3 forwards during the game plus injured scratches, cut him some slack), Lyon has looked like the best of our netminders so far this season. Hopefully he returns to action soon.
Husso came on in relief of Lyon and looked… good? I mean, he definitely looked good… I’m hesitant to say great, but at least good. The team gave up more than a few really good chances in the slot, chances that we as fans are used to seeing end up on the scoreboard. Husso kept Lyon’s energy alive in the net and, one weird own-goal against his predecessor not withstanding, played well enough to keep us in the game.
It’s too bad the rest of the team couldn’t keep us in the game. Yes there were chances, but chances don’t win you games – even a fluky goal would have been SOMETHING. With one goal to show for the past two outings, the Wings are struggling to get everything clicking just the way it should. Part of that has been missing Larkin, part of that has been missing Compher (or, tonight, Compher shaking off rust), but it needs to get figured out. So far this season, this team has not won a game in which they’ve scored fewer than 4 goals. When things are clicking, they’re really clicking… but when they aren’t, there’s nothing bailing them out. That ain’t gonna cut it if they wanna play hockey in May.
Overall, the goaltending shone tonight (please be OK, Lyon) and that’s a nice change of pace. Aside from that… these boys had best get their heads screwed back on straight. Anaheim is in town Monday, and they’re riding a 5-game losing streak that may very well turn into 6 as they face the Devils on Sunday. Good teams handle struggling teams… and we know the Wings can be a good team. They just weren’t the better team tonight.
LGRW
