In Detroit, Alex Nedeljkovic made 47 saves and the Red Wings defeated the Boston Bruins, 5-3, after falling behind early by an0–2 count.
“One of the critical things in this league is having a goaltender who makes big saves for you at critical times, and [Nedeljkovic] certainly did that tonight,” Red Wings coach Jeff Blashill said. “He was especially big on the penalty kill tonight, and I thought that got us some momentum in the second period.”
Erik Haula and Brandon Carlo scored in the opening period for the two-goal lead for Boston.
“We just made some mistakes we couldn’t overcome,” Bruins coach Bruce Cassidy said.
Dylan Larkin got Detroit on the board with 40 seconds left in the fist period.
“I wasn’t happy with myself on the shorthanded goal, so I wanted to get one back,” Larkin said. “[Oskar Sundqvist] gave me a great screen and I was able to flick one in. That was huge, keeping from us going into the locker room down 2-0.”
Michael Rasmussen tied the game in the middle frame, and Filip Zadina put Detroit up, 3-2.
The Red Wings took a 4-2 lead off a strike from Jakub Vrana.
“This was big for us,” Vrana said. “We put in some of our chances, we played pretty well defensively and [Nedeljkovic] was great.”
Boston’s Patrice Bergeron scored in the third period to cut the Detroit advantage to 4-3.
“I think the late goal in the first gave them some juice going into the room, and that’s something we have to clean up,” Carlo said. “It’s not an issue as long as we stay dialed in and keep on top of things, but we got off our game a little bit in the second period and they took advantage of it.”
Sam Gagner hit for an empty-net goal with 47 seconds left in the game for the 5-3 final.
Jeremy Swayman made 24 saves in the Bruins loss.
You must be logged in to post a comment.