Datsyuk scores two in return, Red Wings best Flyers

 

By @SKubus –

DETROIT – Perhaps it’s a case of ‘whatever you can do, I can do better,’ but for the second straight game, a returning Red Wings player has scored a pair of goals in his first game back.

Stephen Weiss scored his first two of the season Monday night against Ottawa, and Pavel Datsyuk recorded his sixth and seventh of the season in his first game back Wednesday night to help Detroit top the Philadelphia Flyers, 5-2, and improve to 12-5-5 on the season. Tomas Jurco, Henrik Zetterberg and Weiss also scored–the 150th of Weiss’ career–for the Red Wings, while Jimmy Howard stopped 22 of 24 shots. A line of Datsyuk, Weiss and Darren Helm–all natural centers–combined for six points along the way.

“Pavel, Helm and Weiss obviously were the difference for us today, a real positive there, but we played everyone, we had good depth in our lineup,” head coach Mike Babcock said. “I thought it was a good win for us. I’d still like us to be more aggressive in the third period. I thought we got a little cautious. We’ve got to learn to win in an aggressive manner and we will over time.”

Weiss continued to find the back of the net in his second game back, recording his third goal in his second game back from injury. As he said last game, all he can hope for is a “snowball” effect where he continues to build momentum until he gets into a rhythm again.

“I slept pretty good last night,” Weiss said with a laugh. “You’ve just got to stick with it… keep doing the right things off the ice to try to get healthy and believe that when you do get a bounce, it’s going to turn around for you. And so far, these two games, I’ve had some fortunate bounces and hopefully I’ll just keep going.”

But he’s not the only one on a roll lately, as Jurco has quietly amassed five points in the seven games since returning to the lineup after being a healthy scratch for three contests. His head coach has taken notice, too, citing the importance of his offense to the Red Wings’ lineup.

“I thought Jurcs was great, gives us so much pace,” Babcock said. “That line was good, and he was really good and fast, and he gives them some skill. Jurcs, to me, is an important guy for us.”

Weiss opened the scoring, redirecting home a low Darren Helm shot to send Detroit off the ice after 20 minutes with a 1-0 lead.

But just 2:31 into the middle frame, Flyers captain Claude Giroux picked off an errant neutral-zone pass, walked down the left side of the Detroit zone and wired a wrist shot past Howard to tie things at one aside.

Jurco scored his second of the season from DeKeyser at 10:18 to regain the one-goal lead, after the two worked the entire shift to perfection. DeKeyser grabbed the puck behind his own net and wheeled around with speed before sending a quick, hard breakout pass up to Jurco at center ice. Jurco broke in the zone with speed himself, curled up to shake off a defender, dropped the puck to DeKeyser who then let a quick, low slap shot go. Jurco was there to bury the rebound with authority to put Detroit up 2-1.

At 11:47, Datsyuk scored his sixth of the season from Jakub Kindl just six seconds into a Flyers penalty, extending Detroit’s lead to 3-1. That third goal–on 14 shots–was enough for Philadelphia coach Craig Berube, as he pulled Mason in favor of backup netminder Ray Emery.

In a rare Red Wings showing, there was a fight on Joe Louis Arena ice, as Kyle Quincey squared off against Sean Couturier in what wasn’t an overly eventful bout, but the referees let them go the distance.

The Magic Man then put his second of the game home past Emery, batting in a puck that Helm sent airbound trying to put on net at 18:39 of the second period. Weiss drew the secondary assist to give him the fourth point in his second game back.

Voracek continued to keep pace with Pittsburgh’s Sidney Crosby for the NHL’s point-scoring lead, recording his eighth of the season on the power play on a nice feed from Wayne Simmonds to pull the Flyers to within two and make it a 4-2 game at 12:25 of the third period. But that’s as close as the Flyers came, as the Red Wings held on for the victory.

Through 22 games, the Red Wings only sport five regulation losses with their 12-5-5 record, garnering at least one point in the other 17.

“This is what we were aiming for, to get off to this type of start,” Howard said. “We’ve been doing a great job. We’ll enjoy some turkey here tomorrow, get to New Jersey and hopefully play another full 60 minutes.”

The Red Wings head to New Jersey to face the Devils on Friday before returning home to host Vancouver Sunday afternoon.