Red Wings face Kings looking to score more at home (Dec 15, 2016)
DETROIT -- The Los Angeles Kings and the Detroit Red Wings are both experiencing rugged stretches.
Los Angeles (14-12-2) visits Detroit (13-13-4) at Joe Louis Arena Thursday at 7:30 p.m.
The Kings have lost three of their last four after a 6-3 loss at Buffalo Tuesday night, while the Red Wings are 0-2-1 in the first three games of a season-long five-game homestand after losing 4-1 to the Arizona Coyotes at JLA on Tuesday night.
Los Angeles led 2-0, 7:34 into the second period.
"We're fragile. We're a fragile team," said the Kings' Jeff Carter after the game on Tuesday. "You get one bad bounce against you ... they've got good players over there. They're going to have shifts in our end. We get running around, we lose coverage ... we've been doing it all year. Home, away, everywhere. It's time we take a big look in the mirror here because these next six games are pretty crucial."
Los Angeles' next eight games are on the road.
"We've got to get to work tomorrow. I'm sure there will be some video. There's lots to clean up, top to bottom all the way through," Carter said. "There's nothing else you can do but go to work. Good practice tomorrow, go to Detroit and get on the board here on this road trip. That's all there is to it."
Tuesday against Arizona, Detroit failed to take advantage of a team that was tied for the lowest point total in the league and that had been dominated in a 7-0 loss at Pittsburgh the night before.
"Our start, the effort we had in the first period, it's embarrassing. That's on the leaders. That starts with me," Red Wings captain Henrik Zetterberg said after the game Tuesday. "We've got to be better prepared in here to come out. We all know they played last night. They lost pretty bad so we knew they were going to come out and play fast hockey from the start and win a lot of battles. We had to match that and didn't do that. Even though I don't think they played great hockey in the first but that just shows how bad we were."
The Red Wings are 2-8-3 in their last 13 at home and have only managed 21 goals in those games.
Detroit is trying not to put too much pressure on itself to score more goals.
"We got to relax, remember we're playing a game," coach Jeff Blashill told www.mlive.com. "We understand how important it is to everybody -- ownership, fans, us -- but in the end, we got to make sure we bear down, have urgency. But we can't squeeze the sticks so much that we can't play."
The Red Wings are 27th in the NHL in goals per game (2.23).
"If you look around, look at the names in here, it's so much talent," said Frans Nielsen, who signed as a free agent from the New York Islanders on July 1. "I think we've been pretty good defensively and we haven't scored. I thought it was going to be a little bit the opposite when I got here. The good thing is we're playing good defensively, we're getting a foundation without the puck. Now we've got to figure it out with the puck and start putting the puck in the net."
