The Wings headed into San Jose to finish the California portion of their toughest road trip of the season. In usual Detroit fashion, they played like dogshit to start the game and then found their legs later, winning 3-2 on a late goal by Luke Glendening.
1st Period
The Sharks come out dominant, at one point forcing two icings by the Red Wings‘ fourth line and getting Babcock to use his timeout, finally breaking through on a heavily-screened wrister from the point by Matt Irwin. The rest of the period didn’t go much better, as the Sharks take a 14-4 shot advantage into the first intermission after three uneventful power plays split between the two teams. Detroit got the first of those and failed to get a shot. San Jose got the next two, including one on an absolutely awful goaltender interference call. No further harm came and it’s the end of 20.
2nd Period
The 2nd starts better as Datsyuk draws a call for getting in behind Brent Burns and then Pulkkinen slams it into an empty net as the Wings’ power play collapses the defense and Sheahan makes a smart quick pass to get a loose puck to Pulk on the back door. Then things got not-good as Ericsson goes to the box on a super-soft call and Marleau gets a good bounce off the back boards to fire it past Howard from the front of the crease.
The rest of the period wasn’t so bad for the Wings. Antti Niemi put together a combination of good luck and great saves to keep the Wings at one.
3rd Period
The Wings got three power plays in the third, including a four-minute chance and couldn’t solve Antti Niemi until Datsyuk just chucks a backhand that squeaks through to tie it. Later in the period, Brendan Smith goes off as Logan Couture badly slew-foots him. Somehow this ends up in a 4-on-4 which is killed off. As time winds down, Detroit finds an unlikely hero as Gustav Nyquist feeds Luke Glendening out front being covered by Joe Thornton. Glendening naturally does what he does and spins around to whip a backhander in for the game-winner.
This game is dumb and fun
Final Thought
Detroit didn’t get swept by California!
Keep the conversation going. What did you think of the game?
