After returning home to Detroit following a 2-1 overtime loss vs. St. Louis on Tuesday, the Red Wings (35-33-7) earned a much-needed 5-3 victory over the Carolina Hurricanes (46-25-4) on Friday night from Little Caesars Arena to keep their playoff hopes alive as they enter the final two weeks of the regular season.
While ultimately being outshot by a 33-21 margin, the Red Wings were able to take the Hurricanes out of their ordinarily hard-forechecking and defensively structured mentality at various points in the game.
The first of those moments came when defenseman Ben Chiarot hammered a shot into the upper right corner of the net from just above the left faceoff dot with 10:57 left in the first period after an Alex DeBrincat shot rang off the right goalpost directly in Chiarot’s wheelhouse for his fourth goal of the year. DeBrincat earned the primary assists (30th assist of the year) along with Dylan Larkin, who got the secondary helper (35th assist).
Detroit quickly cashed in again just 28 seconds later when Lucas Raymond tried to pass the puck to Elmer Soderblom in front of Hurricanes’ goaltender Pyotr Kochetkov, who tipped it to Marco Kasper on the left side of the net for an easy layup goal. For Kasper, it is his 16th goal of the season, with Soderblom earning his seventh assist of the year alongside Raymond’s 48th.
The two quick goals caused the Hurricanes to play out of sync for the remainder of the period, which ended with a 2-0 Detroit lead.
Carolina would answer 1:57 into the second period after a horrid turnover by defenseman Justin Holl on an outlet pass from behind the Red Wings’ goal that was stolen by Seth Jarvis, who passed it to an open Jackson Blake in the slot for a shot that beat Red Wings’ goaltender Cam Talbot past his glove on the right side.
Despite Carolina cutting into the lead, Detroit would respond with another quick outburst as Mark Jankowski’s desperation pass out of the Red Wings zone to defenseman Jacob Slavin was intercepted by Patrick Kane, who lasered a breakaway shot past Kochetkov which deflected off the bottom of the goaltender’s blocker with 10:55 left in the second.
For Kane, it was not only his 20th goal on the season but also his 100th point as a member of the Red Wings. The goal also gives him the most 20-goal seasons by a U.S.-born player in NHL history, passing Hockey Hall of Famer and former Red Wing Mike Modano, who accomplished the feat 16 times.
Detroit struck once again 21 seconds later when Michael Rasmussen denied a clearing attempt by Carolina in their defensive zone, which was recovered by Tyler Motte, who fed the puck back to Rasmussen after he snuck behind the defense to a net-front position in which the 6-foot-6 forward shot past the outstretched pads of Kochetkov into the back of the net for his 11th goal of the season. Motte’s assist was his fifth helper of the year as well.
The Hurricanes would answer back with 7:24 left in the second period when Jacob Slavin threw the puck towards the net, which got deflected by Eric Robinson past Talbot to cut the Red Wings lead to 4-2.
Carolina would pull one goal closer with 7:16 remaining in the third period when a Brent Burns shot deflected off a Red Wings’ stick in front of Talbot into the back of the net.
While Carolina would create quality opportunities in the dying moments of the third, Detroit sealed the deal when DeBrincat scored an empty-net goal with 1.5 seconds remaining to make the score 5-3 in favor of the Red Wings.
Regarding the special teams battle, both teams were unsuccessful, with each team finishing 0-for-2 on the man advantage.
Ironically, the Red Wings have successfully defended five consecutive penalty kill situations, stemming back to their March 29 win over Boston. While this is a small statistical nugget, it is still a source of progress lately, given the team’s league-worst penalty-kill percentage is listed at 69.4%.
The win moves the Red Wings to 77 points with seven games remaining, four points behind the Montreal Canadiens, who hold the second wild-card spot. The problem for the Red Wings is that there are two teams (the New York Rangers and Columbus Blue Jackets) between them and Montreal, which also has seven games remaining. Adding to the convoluted mess is that the New York Islanders sit just one point behind Detroit.
The main focus for the Red Wings will be on what they can control, which is their final seven games of the season, and let the rest of the results play out.
The next game for the Red Wings will be on Sunday vs. the Florida Panthers (44-27-4) from Little Caesars Arena in a 5:30 p.m. ET start. The game is a nationally televised matchup, which will air on TNT, TruTV, and Max.
