Red Wings fall to Avalanche on Nick Lidstrom Night
By Stefan Kubus –
DETROIT – On a night where Nicklas Lidstrom’s No. 5 was raised to the rafters at Joe Louis Arena, five goals were scored in the game, but the deciding one went the wrong way.
Fueled by Jean-Sebastien Giguere’s 35-save evening, the Colorado Avalanche topped Detroit in overtime, 3-2. Andre Benoit scored the game-winner from rookie sensation Nathan MacKinnon. Niklas Kronwall and Tomas Jurco scored for Detroit, while Jimmy Howard turned away 22 shots in the loss.
“I thought we played good, just keep playing like that, let’s bottle it and do it again tomorrow and we’re going to win more than we lose,” Detroit head coach Mike Babcock said. “I liked our effort, I liked all four lines, did a lot of good things, (Jonas Gustavsson) gets a chance to go tomorrow. We need to win a game.”
David Legwand (Grosse Pointe Woods) started the game, his first in Detroit, centering Gustav Nyquist and Johan Franzen on the Red Wings’ top line. In his debut, he played 15:42 and recorded two shots. He was originally credited with an assist on Jurco’s power play goal, but that was later given to Danny DeKeyser.
“I think we gave up a few free ones to them tonight,” Legwand said of the game. “I think they got a couple freebies, and then we’ve got to take care of the puck and manage the situations and do the right things.”
Babcock said he liked what he saw out of his newest center.
“I thought he was real good,” Babcock said. “And he gave us a chance to roll everyone out the door, he gave us confidence.”
On Nick Lidstrom Night, it was only fitting that three Swedes hooked up for the game’s first goal.
Kronwall took a nifty feed from Joakim Andersson from the half-boards in the Colorado zone, cut to the net and chipped a backhand shot up and over Giguere’s left shoulder on the short side for the 1-0 lead at 12:33. There wasn’t much room there, but No. 55 found it. Jonathan Ericsson drew the secondary assist on Kronwall’s seventh of the season.
Matt Duchene tied the game up for Colorado with 9:49 remaining in the middle frame. Defenseman Erik Johnson’s shot deflected off Kronwall’s skate and took a weird, quick bounce off the end boards right in front to Duchene who had an empty net.
Jurco scored his fifth of the year on the power play with 7:50 to play in the second period, banging home a loose puck in front of the net. But P-A Parenteau tied the game back up, 2-2, 5:49 into the third period, slapping home a rebound past Howard on his backhand.
“It was kind of a weird bounce, I just tried to follow the puck,” Jurco said.
It took overtime to decide the game, and MacKinnon – his 22 goals, 29 assists and 51 points in 63 games lead all rookies in each of those categories – found an uncovered Benoit streaking in from the point, who buried a one-timer upstairs to clinch the victory for the Avs.
“When you give a player like MacKinnon that much time, he’s going to find the open man,” Howard said. “Even though he’s a young kid, it’s his first year, he still is a heck of a player.”
In a rather quick turnaround, Detroit faces New Jersey Friday night. Puck drop from Joe Louis Arena set for 7:30 p.m.
“To be honest with you, I must’ve said to the coaches on the bench a number of times tonight, I thought we were playing real well, I thought we had good jump, contributions from everyone, a much better game than we played the other night, so I was pleased to see it,” Babcock said. “To me, since the Olympic break, we’ve played three of our four games really well and our other game was right down to the wire, as well.”