SUNRISE, Fla. _ The Detroit Red Wings left the first game of their weekend excursion against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday saying they had to play better.
They found a way to look worse _ much worse _ on Sunday. Facing a fellow lottery-bound opponent Sunday afternoon at BB&T Center, the Wings were routed by the Florida Panthers, 6-1.
There was no support for Jimmy Howard, just as there was none for Jonathan Bernier the night before. The Panthers reached double digits in shots in every period. The Wings had three in the first, eight in the second. Final shots were 43-20.
It was as ugly as the score showed and the second time the Wings were shelled by an opponent in the last two weeks; their next game is Tuesday at Montreal, where they lost 7-3 in October and were routed by the Canadiens, 8-1, Feb. 26. And Sunday's loss came as a response to the Lightning loss.
After Saturday's 3-2 loss at Tampa Bay, coach Jeff Blashill spoke of how the Wings didn't have enough guys going, how they needed more from their best players. But the Wings didn't make things difficult enough for Sam Montembeault, a goalie playing in his third career NHL game. Thomas Vanek had Detroit's sole goal, on a power play in the second period.
The Panthers were the fresher team, but it's not exactly an arduous trek to fly from Tampa to Fort Lauderdale. Yet the Wings looked sluggish and uninterested as the first period began, and soon trailed by two goals. Josh Brown picked up his first career NHL goal when he fired a shot from the high slot that went glove-side on Howard at 6:42. Jamie McGinn scored on a rebound 13 seconds into a penalty on Madison Bowey, at 9:22. At the time, the Wings had one shot on net. They failed the rest of the period, too, at creating good scoring chances, and were outshot, 15-3.
The absences of Dylan Larkin (neck) and Mike Green (virus) has left the already scoring challenged Wings hard up for offense, but Vanek is savvy enough to produce even in such circumstances. He scored for the second straight game during a power play in the second period, taking a pass from Frans Nielsen and firing a slap shot from the bottom of the left circle. It was Vanek's fourth point in four games since returning from a sore hip, and 33rd point in 58 games.
Frank Vatrano tipped Aaron Ekblad's shot to make it 3-0 before Vanek's goal. Any hopes of a rally were doused soon after the third period began. Jonathan Huberdeau made it 4-1 at 1:26 when he had a wide-open net. It was former Wings forward Riley Sheahan _ the guy who went 79 games in 2016-17 without scoring a goal and then scored twice in the final game at Joe Louis Arena _ who piled on 85 seconds later when he sent a pretty backhand pass cross-slot to Dryden Hunt. Hunt had a wide open net to score his first career NHL goal. Aleksander Barkov showed off his fabulous shot to net his 30th goal of the season, at 7:44.
