Red Wings Dominate the Kings

DETROIT — By the finish, the score finally reflected what had happened out on the ice.

The Detroit Red Wings started with passion and finished with a flurry, scoring three goals in the last six minutes, to frame a 7-3 victory over the Kings on Thursday at Joe Louis Arena.

So ended the Kings’ five-game winning streak, and so continued their futility against the Red Wings, who have won the last 10 games between the teams, including four this season.

The Kings can only hope to take out that frustration against St. Louis on Saturday.

“We got to wake up tomorrow and forget this game,” Sean Avery said. “We have to be extremely professional. We have to go out and play hard. We have to hammer those guys Saturday and win another five in a row.”

Consider that a palate cleansing after a distasteful game.

The Red Wings outshot the Kings, 45-25, including 19-4 in the second period, which drove Mathieu Garon, the Kings’ beleaguered goaltender, from the game. The Red Wings had six players with multi-point games, including Nicklas Lidstrom (one goal, three assists) and Henrik Zetterberg (two goals).

That the Kings trailed only 4-3 after Lubomir Visnovsky’s power-play goal midway through the third period was because of some missed opportunities by the Red Wings and some great saves by Garon.

Said Avery: “We had maybe five guys who played good tonight, the rest of us were ...”

This continued a familiar pattern.

The only players who played for the Kings on Thursday that were on the ice for their last win against the Red Wings -- Oct. 12, 2002 -- were Visnovsky, Mattias Norstrom and Eric Belanger. Luc Robitaille was there for that victory, but he was on the other bench. Dustin Brown was a teen-ager in the Ontario Junior Hockey League.

In other words, it has been a while.

“We got to beat those guys,” Avery said. “We’re going to have to play them in the playoffs.”

That is still a ways off. Others were still reflecting on a woeful night.

Defenseman Aaron Miller took personal responsibility, having been on the ice for the Red Wings’ first four goals. The first, a shot by Pavel Datsyuk, went off his skate and into the net. The next three? Well, Miller was harder on himself than he was on the Red Wings.

“There is no reason for the way I played,” Miller said. “I was awful. A puck goes off your skate and into the net, that happens, that’s hockey. I handed the puck over and gave them chances.”

His wasn’t a solo performance.

The Red Wings claimed possession of this game from the start, outshooting the Kings, 13-2, in the first 10 minutes. That the game was scoreless at the end of the period was a credit to the play of Garon, who made 14 saves, four when pucks ricocheted off his mask.

His luck ran out in the second period. When Zetterberg scored two goals in 52 seconds to give the Red Wings a 4-2 lead, 13:56 into the period, Garon was gone but not before turning his stick into toothpicks.

“I had to get him out of there,” Coach Andy Murray said. “It’s like in baseball, you only allow your pitcher to throw so many pitchers. Mathieu had seen enough shots.”