The Detroit Red Wings desperately needs the type of scoring they had against the Buffalo Sabres Wednesday night.
Detroit beat the Sabres 7-3, with Patrick Kane recording two goals and five points and Alex DeBrincat getting a goal and four points.
The win ended a six-game losing streak that caused them to flail in the standings – they’re now sixth in the Atlantic Division and fifth in the race for two wild-card spots. But the Red Wings scored more goals on Wednesday than in their previous four games combined.
This team was imploding because it couldn’t score. The Red Wings scored only 11 times during the six-game skid, and they’re now 18th in the NHL with 2.86 goals-for per game.
“We still got to figure out how to score some goals,” Detroit winger Alex DeBrincat told reporters after the Red Wings’ loss on Monday – a 2-1 defeat at the hands of the Ottawa Senators.
The Wings seemed to “figure out” how to score some goals on Wednesday. It came at a good time because the lack of offense was starting to look like a condemnation of where Detroit is as a team. That came after Red Wings GM Steve Yzerman looked at his roster at last week’s trade deadline and decided to acquire only a bottom-six forward in Craig Smith and a subpar goaltender in Petr Mrazek despite having the cap space for a bigger move.
For a while after the Red Wings changed coaches after Christmas, they looked like they’d finally turned the corner as a team and were on pace to make the playoffs. But they’ve gone 2-7-1 in their last 10 games, essentially squandering all their gains leading up to that point. Not only did their offense drop, but their goals against increased by more than a goal per game between the beginning of Todd McLellan’s time as Wings coach and Feb. 8 onward.
There are encouraging signs from Wednesday’s game that suggest the Red Wings could recover from the two-point deficit and retake a wild-card spot. Marco Kasper got three points after going six outings without a point, and five players had multi-point nights.
But they faced the Sabres, which have allowed the third-most goals against per game in the league and sit last in the Eastern Conference by six points. The Sabres have conceded four or more goals seven times in their last eight games.
The real challenge is whether Detroit can carry that momentum into games against the Carolina Hurricanes, Vegas Golden Knights and Washington Capitals, which all sit in the top 10 for fewest goals against per game. The Red Wings don’t have Buffalo to beat up every night, and they still have the most difficult schedule in the league in their remaining 17 games, according to tankathon.com.
The Wings will have a tough time to make up for their slump, even though Wednesday was a good start. If they figured out how to score goals for good this time – and how to shut the door a bit more on defense – then ending their lengthy playoff drought looks far more probable. But if they fail again, the responsibility will fall at the feet of Yzerman.
Detroit must now prove whether they’re a playoff team or whether they’re a flawed group that desperately needed an infusion of talent by the deadline. They didn’t get it, and they could end up paying the price for it.
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