Wings Bow to Flames for Second Straight Loss

The Red Wings lost their second straight on the road, guaranteeing them a below .500 record on this their first of two western road trips in November. On the other hand, the 3-2 victory for the Calgary Flames was their 8th straight win, and 8th straight home-ice win.

The Wings opened the scoring on their first shot of the game, at 1:20 when Brendan Shanahan stole the puck from Andrew Ference at the Flames blue line. Shanahan then tapped the puck to Robert Lang who skated in all alone, putting it between Mikka Kiprusoff’s pads giving the Wings the early 1-0 lead.

The Flames returned the favor at the 11:01 mark of the first when Daymond Langkow stole a Jason Williams’ pass just inside the Flames zone, then made a quick pass up to Tony Amonte who was breaking in at the Wings blue line. Amonte was in alone and put his shot between Manny Legace’s pads to tie the score at 1-1.

At 16:41 of the second period the Flames grabbed the lead on a goal by Chuck Kobasew on the power play. Legace couldn’t grab the puck in front of the crease as Kobasew took three stabs at his own rebounds before scoring.

Darren McCarty then added an insurance goal for the Flames early in the third period. The goal, coming at 2:03, was a wrap around by McCarty on Legace’s glove side after he stopped the puck behind the net from a shoot-in by Langkow.

The Wings managed only 22 shots on Kiprusoff, who stopped 21 of them, while Legace stopped 25 of the Flames’ 28 shots. The Wings were 0-for-3 on the power play. The Flames converted one of their four power play opportunities.

The Wings will now travel to Edmonton to face the Oilers tomorrow night.