The Detroit Red Wings had three real power plays Thursday, and again were unable to get a conversion.
They beat the Vancouver Canucks, 3 1 at Joe Louis Arena, but didn’t make it easy on themselves by squandering man advantages. They did at least threaten on one of them.
Andreas Athanasiou injured
http://www.detredwingsjersey.com/xavier-ouellet-jersey-c-26.html, to miss at least 1 game
“The one late in the second period I thought was good,” coach Jeff Blashill said. “I thought it showed signs of doing a good job. But we still have to be better. When the game is on the line we’ve got to score.
“We had one in the third, and you can kind of put them away and we didn’t. So we have to be better in that area.”
Henrik Zetterberg said that, had some good motion, some good shots. But it would have been nice to see a puck or two go in.”
The Wings technically were 0 for 4 on power plays Thursday, but one only lasted four seconds before being nullified by a Detroit penalty. It left the Wings with three power play goals on 35 opportunities dating back 10 games.
“We need to get more pucks to the net and establish movement and cause confusion in their end,” defenseman Mike Green said. “We’ve been working on it. It’s not easy to score on the power play in this league and we have to make sure we bear down.”
While the previous game, at Philadelphia, saw the Wings have solid possession time on two of their man advantages, the previous stretch of power plays wasn t good at all.
“We weren t winning enough face offs, and then our entries weren t good enough,” coach Jeff Blashill said earlier Thursday. “So then you don’t have enough possession time and you’re not going to get enough power play opportunities. Last game, we had some of that, we did a little bit better job on entries, we did a little bit better job on face offs. We had better attack mentality, but we have to have better net presence.”
Earlier in the day, Blashill complimented Frans Nielsen’s power play unit with Dylan Larkin, Andreas Athanasiou, Justin Abdelkader and Brendan Smith but chided Henrik Zetterberg’s unit with Gustav Nyquist, Tomas Tatar, Niklas Kronwall and Mike Green.
“Nielsen’s unit is attacking, and they ve had lots of chances,” Blashill said. “The other unit has to do a better job.”
Nielsen’s unit has the advantage of two very fast skaters in Larkin and Athanasiou. Nielsen said he thinks that the Wings are getting enough shots on the power play
http://www.detredwingsjersey.com/brendan-smith-jersey-c-28.html, and that “when a power play is struggling, you ve got to simplify and keep getting pucks to the net and, hopefully, we will get a bounce our way and then build confidence that way.”
Power play meetings have emphasized all five skaters helping to win face offs, because losing them wastes 20 odd seconds on retrieval. While converting a power play in four of five games
http://www.detredwingsjersey.com/jimmy-howard-jersey-c-30.html, as the Wings did at the start of the season, isn’t realistic for the long term, it’s deflating just how little has been generated lately.
“You want to gain some momentum to continue into 5 on 5,” Green said. “Momentum usually escalates a lot more when you get that goal, so it’s imperative that we start scoring.”
One guy who would help the power play is right wing Thomas Vanek, who has been out since a hip ailment flared up Oct. 27. Vanek has started skating on his own, and Blashill said
Gustav Nyquist Jersey, “I assume when he is ready to come off the long term IR, that he should be ready to step in and play.”
Vanek is eligible to return Nov. 18 at Washington.