It was supposed to be a coronation, with the fans squished into Joe Louis Arean, all decked out in red. The anticipation was by around 11ish, Wings fans would be partying like it was, oh say, 2002. The Wings were fresh off a huge road victory in Game 4 where they dealt the Penguins their first at home in the playoffs. They were coming back home to finish off the Penguins and pop open the champagne. Unfortunately for Detroit, hockey, more importantly playoff hockey, sure as hell ain’t built on supposed.
The Cup, the champagne and the fourth and final series clinching win will have to wait longer. Thanks to Max Talbot and Petr Sykora, and another fantastically dreadful start by the Wings, the Penguins were the party poopers in Game 5, coming away with a 4-3 triple overtime victory to send the scene back to Pittsburgh for Game 6 on Wednesday night.
What could have been a celebration wound up feeling more like a funeral. Around 1 a.m., Sykora finished off the fifth-longest game in finals history, beating Wings goalie Chris Osgood short side, with the Penguins on a four-minute power play that was set up by Jiri Hudler’s high sticking call on Rob Scuderi. As Wings coach Mike Babcock stated after the loss, you hate to see Sykora end up with the puck because he’s that kind of guy, you knew it was going in.
It was a frantic night of emotional swings from Monday night into early Tuesday morning, but for the Wings, this one ended the way it started: badly. Stunningly similar to Game 5 against Dallas in the WCF, the Wings were passive, they were shaky, and they couldn’t get out of their own way. The Penguins were faster and looser, the way we all wished the Wings would’ve come out. But instead, Marian Hossa put the Wings behind the eight ball early, and then Niklas Kronwall’s attempt at clear was fired off of Adam Hall’s skate and behind Osgood. 14:41 in, Pittsburgh sucked the life completey out of the Joe and the Wings.
You would have thought Detroit learned their lesson the way they started against Dallas. Like the Stars, Pittsburgh took full advantage and you know what they say: one big road win deserves another. But in the second period, Darren Helm put a charge into the stoic Joe faithful, getting the Wings on the board by tossing a shot at the net that ended up going off a Penguins and past Fleury. The crowd went wild. The Wings were back on their game and back into the game.
With the crowd behind them, the Wings came roaring back and who better than to lead the calvary than Zetterberg to Datsyuk on a power play to send everyone soaring out of their seats. And with things all squared at two, the Wings were relentless. Now they were the ones faster, harder and refusing to be denied. And moments later, the cup seemed inevitable, as Brian Rafalski took a pass from Johan Franzen and fired a laser to put the Wings up 3-2. And then 10 a half minutes later, disaster struck in the form of Max Talbot.
This wasn’t the first time we’ve seen this sort of helter-skelter, Chinese fire drill scene during these playoffs in the last 80 or 90 seconds of a game. We saw it in Game 5 of the Nashville series, with the Wings up 1-0, the Predators pulled goalie Dan Ellis and tied the game with 44 seconds left to send the game to overtime. Chris Osgood had to stone Avs defenseman Jon-Michael Liles with about 8 seconds to go in Game 1 of the semifinals to secure victory. But those moments that made us clench our instestines made this moment seem like a warm sunny day at the local fair.
35 seconds. There’s not a lot you can accomplish in 35 seconds, but Max Talbot put a rebound past Osgood (with Fleury pulled, giving the Pens the extra attacker) to tie the game at 3 and sent Game 5 into overtime. No more ‘We want the cup’ chants that the crowd had been chanting since about the five mark of the third period. Unquestionably, it was third period that will be remembered for quite some time, but probably not fondly for the Wings.
Emotionally the Wings went from low to high back to low as the overtimes came and went. And so did the Wings’ chances. For 19:35 of the third period, the Penguins were reeling, oh my gosh how they were reeling. Penguins goalie Marc-Andre Fleury turned out to be practically goalie and defenseman, and had it not been for Fleury, there’s no denying the fact that Pittsburgh wouldn’t be playing any kind of Game 6.
The Penguins goalie faced 58 shots and got 55 of them. His team was outshot 14-4 in the third and 27-6 through the end of the first overtime. Zetterberg, Franzen and Cleary had their chances. Holmstrom had one point blank, all to be turned away by Fleury. Fleury and Pens managed to weather the Wings’ storm front. Despite Detroit overcoming early jitters and two goals, the Wings were denied the game-winner, series clincher.
Instead, their bags must be re-packed and new batch of plane tickets to Pittsburgh needed to be purchased. These tensions and pressures have mounted before, and the Wings each time, have managed to conquer them. They surfaced against Nashville and reappeared against Dallas. And yes this is the grandest stage of them all, and if it was easy, then every team would be here.
But the Wings simply can’t dwell on what happened in Game 5. The turnaround is quick, with Game 6 looming Wednesday night. Fluids must be consumed and memories erased. And just as no one felt sorry for Nashville losing leader Jason Arnott or the Avs’ scary string of injuries or the Stars’ falling behind 0-3, this is the finals: there’s no time to feel sorry for yourself because nobody else is going to feel sorry for you.
Detroit has no choice other than to get up off the mat and go play again. It’s not as though they were terribly outplayed by the Penguins. They played well, pretty damn good even. Good enough to win though? Not if you don’t play a full 60 minutes. And the Wings didn’t do that.
The Wings have been a pretty good road team all season, and surprisingly, all three of their previous playoff series have ended on the road, with both Nashville and Dallas ending in six games. We wondered after that Game 5 home loss how the Wings would respond in Game 6 going back to Dallas. A quick refresher, they responded with a fantastic start in which they were rewarded with a three goal, first period effort. The Wings went on to win the game and head to finals.
This may be the same song, just a different quarter in the juke box, but the scenario remains almost the same. The Wings wanted it more than the Stars did and it showed. Now, it’s a matter of looking into the mirror and seeing how bad they truly want to win the Stanley Cup.
