Red Wings Blow Third-Period Lead, Fall to Columbus in Shootout

For the first time this season, the Detroit Red Wings carried a lead into the third period only to come away with a loss.

Saturday night, the Red Wings led the Columbus Blue Jackets, 3-0, after two periods. Columbus scored four-straight goals to take a 4-3 lead before the Red Wings tied the game back up. Detroit would eventually fall in a shootout in which they were kept scoreless.

Detroit’s defensive collapse began with a goal by Rostislav Klesla at 7:08 of the period, a blast from the blue line that appeared to be deflected before getting past Red Wings’ goalie Chris Osgood.

David Vyborny pulled the Blue Jackets to within one 3:31 later when he was left all alone to deflect a shot from the left wing by Klesla.

A Mikael Samuelsson turnover in the Columbus zone led to the third Blue Jackets’ goal with 5:44 remaining. Vyborny stole the puck and sent an outlet pass to Rick Nash, who easily skated around a slashing Andreas Lilja before cutting in front of Osgood and putting the puck around him.

Just 29 seconds later, Manny Malhotra scored after two Detroit turnovers in their own zone. He was left all alone in front of Osgood to bang a shot that defelected off of the Red Wings’ goalie and into the net.

Pavel Datsyuk tied the game with 1:50 remaining, breaking into the Columbus zone and rifling a shot past Blue Jackets’ netminder Pascal Leclaire.

Johan Franzen and Steve Yzerman scored first-period goals and Robert Lang added one in the second period to build Detroit’s initial lead.

After a scoreless overtime, Jaroslav Balastik scored on the first shootout attempt for the only goal of the tiebreaker.

Osgood finished the game with 23 saves on 27 shotsm facing more shots in the third period than in the rest of the periods combined. Leclaire made forty saves on 44 shots against.

Neither team scored on the power play, with Detroit having three chances and Columbus having two.

The Red Wings will be back in action on Monday when they visit the St. Louis Blues.