Red Wings Rebound but Fall to Oilers in Shootout

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The Detroit Red Wings rallied from a 2-0 deficit in the third period to take a late 3-2 lead Tuesday night but were unable to hold on, falling to the Edmonton Oilers 4-3 in a shootout.

The point earned was just Detroit’s third in the last ten games, a slump that coincides with injuries to most of their defensemen.

Rookie Jonathan Ericsson, in the lineup to fill in on the depleted blueline, started Detroit’s comeback at 5:42 of the third period.

With the Red Wings on the power play, Valtteri Filppula sent a pass from the bottom of the left faceoff circe to Ericsson up high for a one-timer that found its way through Edmonton goalie Mathieu Garon.

Pavel Datsyuk added a second power play goal with 7:42 left in regulation, rifling a shot from the left circle over Garon’s shoulder.

Detroit took the lead with 2:16 remaining on a Valtteri Filppula goal. A stretch pass from Brett Lebda sprung Filppula into the Edmonton zone. Unable to control the puck quickly, he was left to throw a shot on net from an acute angle but it found a way into the net.

The Oilers tied the game back up with 29 seconds left, when Fernando Pisani lifted a rebound over Detroit netminder Chris Osgood in a goal-mouth scramble.

Robert Nilsson scored the only goal of the shootout to win the game for Edmonton, putting a shot past Osgood’s glove in the third round of the tiebreaker.

The Oilers had opened the scoring at 2:54 of the second period. Osgood scrambled to make a series of saves but Tom Gilbert was left open at the bottom of the left circle to take a pass and lift a shot into the net.

Geoff Sanderson extended the lead at 1:44 of the third, taking an outlet pass from Jarret Stoll and catching Ericsson flat-footed at the Detroit blueline to race in alone on Osgood and put a shot between his pads.

Osgood finished the night with 26 saves on 29 shots. Garon stopped 40 of 43 Detroit chances.

Detroit’s recently-struggling power play made good on two of seven opportunities while the Oilers went one-for-six.


Trade deadline acquisition Brad Stuart was not in the Detroit lineup.

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Clark founded the site that would become DetroitHockey.Net in September of 1996. He continues to write for the site and executes the site's design and development, as well as that of DH.N's sibling site, FantasyHockeySim.com.

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