LES HABS
Five different Red Wing players scored goals in an impressive win
over long-time Original Six rival Montreal Canadiens. The Red Wings
won 5-1, making their record 4-2 over the last six games. Slava
Kozlov, Sergei Fedorov, Nicklas Lidstrom, Jamie Macoun and Doug
Brown scored for the Wings.
"Scotty's been saying some things the last week," Goalie Chris
Osgood said. "I don't want to say what it is, but we've been paying
attention. Everybody's really stepped it up and used what Scotty's
been saying on the ice."
Sergei Fedorov said the main point of coach Bowman's message was
simply to get back to what the Red Wings do best and this is
skating. "Red Wings' hockey," Fedorov said. "That's what it's all
about. It's scoring a lot of transition goals. It's no turnovers.
It's tight defense. Once we got going tonight, it was like, `That's
how we do it, guys. Let's keep it going.' "
The Canadiens took the lead early in the first period., but the Red
Wings scored five straight goals and out shot Les Habitants 39-18
for the game. Kozlov and Fedorov broke the game open with goals 33
seconds apart and Lidstrom's unassisted short handed goal gave the
Wings a 3-1 lead with 43 seconds left in the opening period. Jamie
Macoun made it 4-1 with his first regular season goal since March
13, 1997, an unassisted effort to boot. That ended a personal
scoring drought of 129 straight games. Dougie Brown got the final
score.
OT BABY
How sweet it is. Even though it was an overtime win against an
expansion team, the Wings will take any point they can scrounge up
these days. Points have been hard to come by. Slava Kozlov scored
2:54 into overtime after a Nashville player lost the puck in the
corner, giving the Red Wings a 2-1 victory over the upstart
Predators . The loose puck went to Detroit's Sergei Fedorov and
then to Steve Yzerman, whose sweet pinpoint pass to Kozlov set up
the game-winning goal.
"I had a good feeling going into overtime," Fedorov said. "They
finally made a mistake and we got the puck and turned it into a
goal." Kozlov took the pass from Yzerman near the right post and
snapped a shot past goalie Tomas Vokoun for just his ninth goal of
the season. Kirk Maltby also scored. "Kris slipped the puck to me
and it just slipped in," Maltby said. "More times than not, the
goalie will make the save on that, and you hope for the rebound.
But this time, it happened to go in."
OZZIE THE TIE KING
It's been 31 games and just over four years since goalie Chris
Osgood last gave up an overtime goal. With a 2-2 tie against the
Vancouver Canucks, he extended his amazing OT shutout streak to
136:15. Ozzie still remembered the last regular season overtime
goal he's given up.
"It was against the Rangers, I think Verbeek scored it," said
Osgood, who made two of his 16 saves in the overtime period. "It
was a back-door goal. That was quite a while ago. "I take pride.
It's a thing that's important to me and fun at the same time
because I use it as a challenge to see how long I can go without
letting one in."
Darren McCarty scored 6:43 into the third period to secure the tie
for the Red Wings, who are 6-0-2 in heir last eight meetings
against the Canucks going way back to March 8, 1997. McCarty's goal
came four minutes after the Canucks went ahead 2-1. Igor Larionov
scored Detroit's other goal. Winger Brendan Shanahan had an assist
on Larionov's goal, ending an 11-game stretch without a single
point. It is believed that he is playing hurt.
"We felt we deserved to win. Garth Snow had a great game. We hit
three posts early in the second period which could've given us a
nice cushion but we fought back and had a lot of chances," said
Shanahan. "We're not happy that we got a tie because we felt we
played well enough to win."
OIL SLICK
Steve Yzerman had a shorthanded goal for Detroit and that wasn't
enough as the Edmonton Oilers beat the Red Wings 4-1. "They buried
their chances," Brendan Shanahan said of the Oilers. "We missed
open nets. As it turned out, the second period was where they
scored their goals."
Shanahan hasn't scored in 12 games. His last goal was Dec. 23
against the Nashville Predators. "I've never been through 10 or 12
games without a goal," he said. The Wings are 22-19-3 and in first
place in the Central Division, but the team isn't satisfied with
being just a few games over .500, Shanahan said. "The guys get
down on themselves a little bit. I think we've found ourselves in
some games where we haven't played our best."
Chris Osgood was replaced by Norm Maracle at the start of the third
period to finish the game.
BURNED OUT
The Red Wings had 36 shots but it wasn't enough to extinguish the
Flames as they lost 3-1. The Flames won the season series against
Detroit 3-1. Darren McCarty scored the lone goal for the Red Wings
in the defeat. "We played pretty good defensively, but when you're
always coming from behind, the defense isn't much good to you at
that point," said head coach Scotty Bowman.
"It came down to them scoring on their chances and their goalie
making some great saves," said Brendan Shanahan, who is goalless
in his last 13 games after scoring 17 in his first 32. The Wings
did open the scoring on a power play 7:26 into the first period
when Steve Yzerman's centering pass deflected off McCarty's skate
and over the goal line.
EYE OF THE STORM
Chris Osgood gave up a goal in the first minute of the game on a
breakway by Keith Primeau. He also and almost scored one himself
in the last minute of the game in an open net. The win ended a
three-game winless streak from their recent western road trip.
Defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom had a goal and an assist for the Red
Wings, who won for just the seventh time in their last 21 games.
Sergei Fedorov, Dougie Brown and Igor Larionov also scored for
Detroit.
"Ozzie was magnificent, he made so many good saves," Brown said. "A
couple point blank, a couple breakways, a couple one timers and a
couple of wraparounds. You just can't say enough good things about
the way Ozzie played tonight." Ozzie almost scored his second
career goal when his rink length shot at an empty net was just wide
and tapped in by Larionov for Detroit's final goal with only 28
seconds left.
"It would've been nice to score a goal," Osgood said. "I thought I
might as well go for it. It would've been a big boost at this time
of the season." Osgood scored a goal March 6, 1996, at Hartford
when the Hurricanes were still the Whalers.
Ouch! Captain Steve Yzerman had to leave the game in the second
period with a cut above his right eye and a broken nose after he
was hit in the face by a puck. Yzerman went down on the ice trying
to block what he thought was going to be a pass between two former
Red Wings, Paul Coffey and Primeau. Coffey instead fired a shot
that hit Yzerman in the face and opened a deep gash. Yzerman
missed the All-Star Game due to the injury. He was taken to the
hospital to get x-rays and tests. A broken nose was the prognosis
and a whole bunch of stitches.
Kirk Maltby also broke his nose in a third period collision with
Ronnie Francis. He is not having much luck this year in the health
department. Lidstrom broke a 1-1 tie 14:31 into the second period
with a power-play blast from just inside the blue line that
deflected off a Hurricanes defenseman and past goalie Arturs Irbe
for the game winner.
