Red Wings bounce back for 3-1 New Year’s Eve victory over New Jersey

By @SKubus –

DETROIT – When the Red Wings seemed poised to end Wednesday night’s game in overtime or a shootout, they turned that around late in the third to end 2014 on a positive note.

A pair of Darren Helm goals and Henrik Zetterberg’s ninth of the year propelled Detroit to a 3-1 victory over the New Jersey Devils on New Year’s Eve at Joe Louis Arena.

“I wanted to see us compete from start to finish and that’s what we did,” head coach Mike Babcock said. “We’re going on a good road trip now. We need a good road trip. It’s good for our team and development of our team.”

Despite outplaying the Devils throughout the opening frame and having a pair of power-plays, Detroit couldn’t muster up a goal nor more than eight shots on net. The power-play had good looks, but the shots weren’t getting through to Schneider.

“We all talked about it in the room here, wanted to come out and have a better start than we had the last two games and we did that,” Zetterberg said. “In the first we played really solid even though we maybe didn’t have enough chances, enough shots, but they played really tight in front of the goal.”

At 15:37 of the middle frame, Joe Whitney stole the puck and in an instant, sniped a shot high over Howard just under the bar for his first NHL goal, which gave the Devils a 1-0 lead.

Detroit struck back before the period came to a close to tie things up, as Helm potted his sixth of the season just 2:19 after Whitney’s goal, beating Schneider on a wraparound.

When it seemed the Red Wings were destined for another shootout, Zetterberg tipped home a Niklas Kronwall point shot with 5:01 remaining to break the tie and give Detroit a 2-1 lead.

Helm then added his second of the game shortly after, using his speed to zoom past a defender on the outside before burying a shot past Schneider while falling down for a beautiful goal.

“We knew it was going to be a 60-minute game from the start,” Helm said. “They worked hard, we worked hard. I think it could’ve gone either way if the puck would’ve bounced on the other side, but we stuck with it for the full 60 and were able to pull it off.”

Helm’s second of the game stood tall as the final marker to give Detroit a much-needed bounce-back victory after a weak showing against Boston in the team’s last outing.

“I like the direction our team is going,” Babcock said. “I think we’ve got a good team, I think we’re better than we’ve played of late and so now we’ve gotta show it, though. There’s no sense thinking about it or talking about it. We’ve got to do it.”