The Detroit Red Wings handed the Los Angeles Kings their eighth-straight loss with a 5-3 victory on Saturday night at Little Caesars Arena. A wild finish to the second period proved to be the story of this one, as Detroit took a four-goal lead into the third period before the Kings made things a little too uncomfortable, but the deficit was too much to overcome and the Red Wings beat the Kings for the second time this month.
Game Summary
Event Summary
A little pre-game news as Jake Walman was a late scratch due to the illness he’s been battling all week, providing some context to the Brogan Rafferty call-up this afternoon. With a back-to-back set for tomorrow in Toronto, it does make more sense for Rafferty to be up as an extra body should something happen before Sunday’s game starts. I’m not sure how much more Simon Edvinsson needs to do to earn that full-time spot, but he won’t be getting there sitting in press boxes on back-to-back nights.
1st period
Both teams came out with good legs to start this one, with Detroit getting on the board first. David Perron forced a quick turnover that Dylan Larkin collected, and he fired an impossible-angle shot over the shoulder of Cam Talbot for the 1-0 lead.
But Los Angeles bounced back thanks to a fortunate break, as Justin Holl was called for tripping, but replay revealed that Alex Laferriere had toe-picked and was already on his way down before Holl ever made contact. Hard to blame the refs for missing it, but maybe they’ve just lowered the bar too far and I should be upset. Regardless, Trevor Moore, Anze Kopitar and Quinton Byfield combined for a tic-tac-toe sequence to tie the game at one. Not a particularly strong effort from the penalty killers, but that was a great play.
2nd period
The middle frame felt like it was trending uneventfully until it very much did not. First, the Kings found themselves in some penalty trouble. After initially allowing a shorthanded breakaway attempt to Adrian Kempe, the Red Wings earned a short two-man advantage after Moore played the puck with a broken stick. Detroit capitalized immediately, as Patrick Kane’s attempt at a cross-ice pass hit a Kings defender and popped right out to Larkin, who made no mistake in potting his second of the night.
From there, the floodgates opened. With just under four minutes to play, the Red Wings’ fourth line extended the lead after a quick odd-man rush. Birthday boy Joe Veleno started the play by centering to Sprong, whose shot attempt was stopped by Talbot but slid right to Robby Fabbri, who made no mistake in making it 3-1.
Just over a minute later, Detroit struck again with a highlight reel tally from Kane. Alex DeBrincat found Kane streaking toward the middle of the ice, and Kane’s initial touch was right out of his prime Showtime years. Maybe luck, but maybe not, as he perfectly corralled the pass around the defending Matt Roy and undressed Talbot to pad the lead to three.
The action was not yet finished, though. The Kings thought they had one back, but after an alarmingly long review for a play that looked obvious, the video review correctly determined that all three Kings jamming away at a puck that should have been blown dead were in the wrong, and Detroit’s coaches’ challenge successfully took the goal off the board.
In the dying seconds of the period, and after a few good looks by J.T. Compher, Detroit did add one more to take a 5-1 lead into the third. Jeff Petry threw a puck towards the goal that was double-deflected by Christian Fischer and Andrew Copp — no chance for Talbot with a double tip on top of the traffic in front of the net.
3rd period
All Detroit needed to close this one out was a strong start to the third, but things became interesting in a hurry. Los Angeles pulled the chute on Talbot, so it was David Rittich for the rest of this one. The Kings cut into the lead early, as Pierre-Luc Dubois threw a puck on goal that pinballed between Lyon’s pads and slowly slid over the line.
With 14 minutes and change to play, the Kings really made it a game with their third power-play goal of the night, and it was another bang-bang play. Kevin Fiala centered a feed for Kopitar, but Lyon was able to get over for his tap-in attempt; however, Byfield had escaped Moritz Seider in front and buried his second of the game.
But that was as much damage as Los Angeles could manage, as Lyon stopped the remainder of the Kings’ 17 third-period shots, totaling 33-of-36 on the night, and Detroit improved to 4-0-1 to start 2024.
Takeaways
1. Let’s talk leads. It’s been a years-long source of frustration from fans on how this team plays when it gets out to a big lead. I’d like to propose a theory: I don’t think there’s much they can do about it. I think when a team is only middle-of-the-pack for talent, these things happen. When you’re up four, there’s no point in cheating for a breakaway, telling your defensemen to pinch, or carrying the puck in the zone without numbers when your shift is getting long — the types of things that can lead to offense or sustained pressure but leave you exposed defensively. Conversely, the opponent — in this case equal if not slightly more talented team — is full tilt to offense and firing everything at the net. If you don’t have a clear talent advantage, it can be hard to gameplan anything else besides “be smart and endure it.”
There is a little they can do — like stay out of the box (fail) and get good goaltending (pass, but not always the case this year). It just needs to be a full-team effort defensively, which is not this team’s strength to begin with… It was passable tonight — Lyon was forced to make some great saves but the team’s defensemen did a decent job cleaning up second-chance opportunities and didn’t allow many odd-man rushes. And as much as I’d prefer a team taking it to the opponent instead of getting outshot 17-3 in a period, I’m worried about the level of risk the former would open the team up to, so I’m OK with continuing to sit back, even if the results aren’t always pretty.
2. Showtime. I haven’t recapped in a bit, but remain amazed at the subtle skill in Patrick Kane’s game (as well as the not-so-subtle skill, evidenced by his goal) — this is definitely an improved version of the player who limped around the ice for the last two years. I think it will take longer than a couple of months, but I hope Detroit’s other skill players can pick up on the way he can create turnovers and make defensemen second guess themselves, even when he isn’t forechecking at full speed.
3. Decker reported. Here’s to hoping “Detroit beats Los Angeles” is a theme this weekend. Let’s go Lions.
Detroit will fly out tonight to play the Toronto Maple Leafs on Sunday at 7 p.m. The Leafs will also be on a back-to-back, having lost to the Colorado Avalanche today.
