from Ted Kulfan of the Detroit News,
If ever a team needed a result like this one, it was the Red Wings.
Mired in a long and frustrating stretch of losing, the Red Wings surprised the Minnesota Wild Saturday, 5-2.
Tyler Bertuzzi had three goals — his first career hat trick coming in his 100th career game — and Thomas Vanek scored two goals as the Red Wings won for only the third time in the last 16 games (3-10-3).
The Wings (17-23-7) outshot Minnesota 37-19, including 21-2 in the second period, an indication of the Wild’s indifference in this game — and the Wings’ dominance.
“We’ve been playing good hockey, we just hadn’t gotten the results,” Vanek said. “As a group, we’ve been staying positive and saying the right things. If we play like this, as we have been, we’ll get more wins than losses. We just have to keep it up.”
from Sarah McLellan of the Star Tribune,
Not only was the Wild rested and in a relative groove of late, having secured four wins over its past five games, but the Red Wings were finishing off a back-to-back – in addition to being near the bottom of the standings.
But Detroit didn’t play like it, skating more like a team desperate to wrangle a playoff berth than the Wild.
Afterward, Wild players described how the Red Wings outnumbered them, limited their space and cut through the neutral zone with ease – skating while the Wild looked stuck in the mud.
“We were on our heels all night,” defenseman Ryan Suter said. “Didn't really have much. There wasn't a lot of space out there. We'd make plays and turn pucks over, and it was tough to get anything going."
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