Flat Red Wings Fall to Flames

The Detroit Red Wings dug themselves a hole early and could never get out of it, dropping a 4-1 decision to the Calgary Flames Tuesday night.

Johan Franzen had the only goal of the night for the Wings, scored on a power play with 7:23 remaining in the second period. After Niklas Kronwall held the puck in the zone along the left wing boards, Henrik Zetterberg backhanded a pass down to Franzen on the inside edge of the left faceoff circle, where he flung a backhand shot past Miikka Kiprusoff to make it 2-1.

The Wings lost the momentum that goal gave them with 24 seconds left in the period when Matt Stajan won an offensive-zone faceoff back to Dennis Wideman, who sent a seeing-eye shot through traffic and past Detroit netminder Jimmy Howard to put the Flames back up by two.

Mark Giordano’s power play goal with 4:02 left in regulation sealed the deal for the Flames.

Calgary captain Jarome Iginla had opened the game’s scoring just 3:24 in, knocking a loose puck past Howard during a goal-mouth scramble.

At 10:35 of the opening period, Curtis Glencross made it 2-0 with the Flames on a five-on-three. Mike Cammalleri sent a pass to Glencross at the edge of the Detroit crease for an easy tip-in past Howard.

The Flames scored their two power play goals on five chances with the extra attacker. The Red Wings were one-for-four with the man-advantage.

Howard finished the night with 19 saves on 23 shots. Kiprusoff stopped 19 of twenty shots before leaving the game with a lower-body injury after the second period. Leland Irving stopped all six shots he faced to close out the game.