DETROIT—In the end, Patrick Kane played the hero in the Red Wings' 5–4 Sunday night overtime win over the Anaheim Ducks, a role in which he has ample experience, though this time it was a peculiar sort of hero.
For one, Kane's goal—a tidy, low finish on the breakaway—evoked a feeling from the Little Caesars Arena closer to relief than euphoria, after Detroit led by two goals with four minutes to play, only to yield a pair of six-on-five goals to the visitors.
And for another, in the final minute of regulation, Kane was behind the Ducks for what could've been the clinching empty-net goal, only for an Alex DeBrincat pass to hop over his blade. He'd had looks earlier in the extra session to end the game but failed to take them. Then, just before Kane did win it for the Red Wings, his haphazard effort on the forecheck opened up an Anaheim three-on-two that produced not one but two wide open looks at the Detroit net. But the Ducks missed both chances, Marco Kasper won back the puck below the goal line, then sent it up for Kane beyond all three Anaheim skaters, springing Kane for what proved the decisive breakaway.
"I think you see it a lot in overtime where if there's a chance one way, and they don't score, it's usually coming back the other way," Kane said after the game. "I thought Mo [Seider] and Marco did a great job battling there and getting the puck up to me, seeing me right away too behind the D. Obviously, nice to get that one, a little bit better feeling than last night."
Reading between the lines, Kane's assessment of the game winner scans almost as an admission of his own lackluster effort on the final shift (It was Seider and Kasper battling as Kane merely lurked behind the defense), but of course, the strategy proved a winning one for him and the Red Wings.
In describing "a little bit better feeling than last night" (as opposed to a much better one), Kane also called attention to the unfortunate parallels between Detroit's Sunday overtime victory and the previous afternoon's overtime defeat and to the sense of the win as something less than a triumph, given the late lead. In both cases, the Red Wings failed to put a game out of reach despite sufficient opportunity to do just that and wound up burned at five-on-six late. In Sunday's case, that came against a lesser opponent, and it came with the previous afternoon ready to hand as a cautionary tale.
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Perhaps an even more problematic recurrence of Saturday's result Sunday came in the form of another injury to a Detroit centerman. Against Minnesota Saturday, Andrew Copp couldn't finish the game after an apparent upper body injury, nor was he available Sunday, and coach Todd McLellan also ruled him out for Tuesday's game. Then, on Sunday, Michael Rasmussen suffered an injury following a high hit from Trevor Zegras in the second period, ending his evening prematurely. McLellan did not provide any sort of timeline for Rasmussen's absence but said, "When a player gets a blow to the head and doesn't return, it's never a good sign."
All things considered, the Red Wings dealt with Copp's absence reasonably well, though managing that absence of course grew more difficult once Rasmussen too went down. J.T. Compher took advantage of his promotion to the second line with Copp out, playing a responsible and effective game between Kane and DeBrincat. Thanks to a three-for-four night on the power play, Detroit didn't need much by way of five-on-five offense, and while the Ducks do not pose the most formidable of match-up challenges, the Red Wings never appeared uncomfortable at even strength.
"There was a scramble going on," said McLellan, when asked about dealing with Copp's absence and then Rasmussen's. "I thought J.T. Compher had one of his best games in a while...I thought when Joey [Veleno] took more responsibility on and moved up, he was good. [Tyler Motte] went in and was real good on the penalty kill, which was a real good sign for us."
Meanwhile, after Lucas Raymond and Dylan Larkin had been among the most effective Red Wings Saturday afternoon, on Sunday, both showed signs of their international workload during a spell in which their teammates enjoyed a break. Both Larkin and Raymond appeared weary by the end of the weekend, unable to summon their customary pace and influence over play.
When taken as a two-game set, there is an obvious pattern to Detroit's weekend, and it's not an encouraging one: Blown late leads against less-than-elite competition, failed opportunities to put each game out of reach, and two potentially impactful injuries. However, the Red Wings also skate out of the weekend with three from a possible four points, and whatever lessons need to be learned don't come at the cost of any major hurt in the standings.
As Seider pointed out after the game, Detroit's end to the '23-24 season offered the most painful of lessons in the significance of each point over the course of an 82-game regular season. "We came really close last year, and we know every single point matters in the long term," Seider said. "We gotta prepare every single night to be the dominant team out there, try to create and put our game in their faces and not the other way around, just to give ourselves a chance."
The Red Wings will get their next chance to stick their game in an opponent's face Tuesday night in Minneapolis, where they will also have a chance to avenge Saturday's loss to the Wild.
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