Red Wings falter late, lose to Lightning in Game 4 (with photos)

 

By @SKubus and @MichaelCaples –

DETROIT – For the majority of Game 4, it appeared that the Red Wings would be heading back to Tampa Bay with a 3-1 series lead.

Instead, everything is all tied up once again, and the Lightning head back to their home barn with all the momentum.

Tyler Johnson’s overtime goal was the third by the Lightning in the final 7:51 of game play Thursday night at Joe Louis Arena, as they erased a 2-0 Red Wings lead in a hurray to record a 3-2 series-tying victory.

“Even though it was 2-0, and we weren’t getting chances, it was a really positive vibe on the bench, and I think we had gone probably eight periods without scoring a goal,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “As soon as we got that one, we grew up a couple inches on the bench. It was like a weight off our shoulders. Clearly the game changed at that moment, when we scored that goal, and you could just tell our guys had a fire in them that was not going to be put out, and it was a hell of an effort.”

Photos by Jen Hefner/MiHockey

Game 5 in a series that is now a best-of-three will take place Saturday in Tampa Bay – the start time has yet to be determined.

Johnson scored to begin the Lightning rally at the 14:34 mark of the third period, and Ondrej Palat recorded the game-tying goal just 1:17 later.

The late comeback ruined second-period goals from Gustav Nyquist and Joakim Andersson that had the Joe Louis Arena crowd celebrating well before the final buzzer.

Red Wings coach Mike Babcock said that he did something after the game that he rarely does – he talked to his team. The message was to avoid an emotional let-down after letting the game slip away late.

“We talked about that,” Babcock said. “I never talk to our guys after games, hardly ever, but tonight I talked to them just about that. I really believe a couple things in life. I believe if you think you can, you can. And second thing is, I believe we stole Game 1 and they just stole this game. So to me, it should be 2-2, here it is, it’s a best of three, let’s play. We can feel sorry for ourselves. We’ve got a flight to Tampa, we can do that then. Let’s get up and get regrouped and get on with it.”

After being outhit 48-26 in Game 3, the Lightning answered the bell to begin Game 4, outhitting the Red Wings 16-9 in the first period. Ryan Callahan had five of those for Tampa Bay and came together with Brendan Smith early and often throughout the period.

With 5:31 remaining in the opening frame, Filppula was allowed to walk over the Red Wings blue line and down the middle of the zone as the defense backed up too far, but Mrazek was able to make the glove save on the former Red Wings forward’s wrister. That helped keep things scoreless after the opening 20 minutes.

At 5:42 of the second stanza, a strong forecheck by Nyquist led to a turnover on the boards to the right of Bishop. Abdelkader was there to support and shipped a pass to Zetterberg across the ice to the far side of Bishop. With Bishop sliding right to left, the Red Wings’ captain slid a pass in front to Nyquist, and he tapped in his first of the postseason to make it 1-0 Detroit.

Seven minutes later, Bishop then took a holding minor on Tomas Tatar as he curled around the net, setting up a 5-on-3 for 39 seconds. But the Red Wings were unable to capitalize.

But with 5:36 remaining in the period, Andersson put the Red Wings up 2-0 with his first of the series. After skating in and unleashing a wrister, Bishop fought it off and tried to bat the rebound out of mid-air, but instead knocked the puck off the crossbar, sending the puck straight down. As Bishop tried to reach back to knock it out of the crease, the puck deflected off the toe of his stick and squeaked across the goal line.

The third period started out with the Red Wings seemingly cruising towards a series-controlling victory, before the Lightning got the Wings’ defense to budge.

Their comeback seemed to coincide with an injury to Luke Glendening – the Red Wings’ defensive forward cut his hand just a few moments before Johnson line broke free for the game’s final three goals.

“Obviously it was a big play in the game,” Babcock said. “I really felt we should have been going on the power play there, but I can’t control those things. Obviously with him getting his hand cut and missing the rest of the game, matchup-wise the Johnson line got the next three goals. But still, we made some mistakes. I thought we played a good game, did good things, and then in the end we made some mistakes at the end that they capitalized on each one of them.”

Johnson cut the Tampa Bay deficit to one with 5:26 remaining in the third period, finally beating Mrazek at Joe Louis Arena after being shut out twice their last two games in the building.

Just over a minute later, Palat rushed towards the Wings’ goal and got a stick on a centering pass from Johnson to knot the game at 2-2.

The two clubs played to a regulation tie, before Johnson ended it quickly in overtime, burying a backdoor feed from Victor Hedman 2:25 into the extra session.

“When you’re up 2-0 with seven minutes left obviously in a real-tight game, it’s disappointing,” Red Wings captain Henrik Zetterberg said. “But that’s how hockey is and that’s how long series can go sometimes and you’ve just got to regroup and what’s done is done and now we’ve got to refocus and go play better on the road than we did in Game 1 and Game 2.”