"We Were The Second-Best Team": Red Wings' Sluggish Start Costs Them Vs. Bolts

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The good news for the Detroit Red Wings is that they displayed resolve and resilience against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday evening.

The bad news is that their first half of the contest was extremely sluggish, which ultimately cost them a chance at points in the standings.

The Lightning badly outshot the Red Wings in the opening 20 minutes of play, getting a pair of goals from forward Brayden Point en route to what was a 4-2 win at Benchmark International Arena. 

Making matters even more complicated for the Red Wings is that goaltender John Gibson departed after the first period with an injury and did not return; Daniil Tarasov took over. 

Against a team like the Lightning, essentially taking an entire period off isn't going to cut it. 

"Today, I think probably only about 30 minutes of hockey that was good enough to get points, and that’s too good of a team to spot them a first period like we did tonight," said forward J.T. Compher, who scored early in the third period. "We didn’t execute well enough. We weren’t quick enough. We weren’t battling hard enough. And you’re going to have stretches of that, but it can’t be periods - maybe a couple of shifts in a row and then snap back into it.

We spotted them a period, and we weren't able to battle all the way back." 

The Red Wings began flipping the script at the midway point of the second period when Lucas Raymond tallied his sixth goal of the season. They had multiple chances in the third period to knot the score after Compher cut the lead to one goal at the 5:29 mark, but couldn't come up with the equalizer. 

"I think early in the game, we weren't skating hard enough to draw penalties, and in the third, our details and work ethic were much better and gave us some chances," Compher said. "But we weren't able to capitalize." 

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Meanwhile, head coach Todd McLellan pulled no punches about how his team played during the game's first half.

“Obviously, we were the second-best team. We would’ve been the third-best team if there was three playing, but not a lot of jump or pop right off the bat, we took some penalties, so their best players began to feel really good about the game.

We defended with basically one player at a time, the other four were basically standing still, and they're (Lightning players)  in constant motion," he said. "Real tough start for us, but on the bright side, it didn’t look good, but we found a way to claw back in there.”

The Red Wings return home to face the Vegas Golden Knights on Thursday evening. 

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