Making up ground in a playoff race is a difficult climb. The Detroit Red Wings have won seven straight games but, as coach Todd McLellan said, they still have a lot of work to do.
They’ll look to make it eight in a row when they wrap a four-game homestand against the San Jose Sharks on Tuesday.
Despite the surge, the Red Wings entered Monday behind three teams and tied with two others in the chase for the two Eastern Conference wild-card spots.
Detroit is 7-1-0 since McLellan replaced Derek Lalonde as head coach.
“I don’t think Todd and (assistant coach Trent Yawney) coming in just lifted the spirit,” McLellan said. “We had to try to map out a bit of a plan but they’ve lifted their own spirit with the way they’ve played and the way they’ve bought in.
“We’re just trying to guide them through it all. But you win seven games in a row, you’re feeling pretty good and the spirit’s high. So we’re in a good spot. But all we did was crawl back into it. Now we’ve got a lot of work in front of us.”
Detroit’s streak matches its longest since Jan. 12-23, 2012. The Red Wings’ most recent eight-game win streak lasted from Jan. 17-Feb. 5, 2008.
“Early in the season, I kept sitting up here and saying that I believe that there’s more in that locker room,” said captain Dylan Larkin, who has six goals in the last six games. “Unfortunately, it took a coaching change to get that going. But I guess that’s the business of our sport. It’s exciting to see the answers were in there and now we’re on a roll.”
Alex DeBrincat and Patrick Kane carry seven-game point streaks into Tuesday’s contest. They had first-period goals in Detroit’s 6-2 home win over Seattle on Sunday.
The Sharks have lost three straight and are 3-13-1 over their last 17 games.
In their latest defeat, the Sharks had 37 shots on goal against the Minnesota Wild’s Marc-Andre Fleury on Saturday but only one got past the veteran netminder, resulting in a 3-1 loss.
“I think it was a lot of chances we could have scored (Saturday),” forward William Eklund said. “I think we had a lot of grade-A chances. We’ve got to find a way to score more goals here. We haven’t done that lately.”
San Jose, which begins a five-game road trip on Tuesday, hasn’t scored more than three goals in its last 13 contests.
“I thought we competed hard, worked hard, (and) did some really good things,” Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky said. “(We) did some good things and some things we got to get better at.”
Mikael Granlund leads the Sharks with 36 points but has just one goal since Nov. 29.
Defenseman Jake Walman notched an assist on Saturday after missing the previous eight games due to a lower-body injury. Walman played the past two-plus seasons with the Red Wings.
San Jose won the first meeting with Detroit, 5-4, at home on Nov. 18 on rookie Macklin Celebrini’s overtime goal.
–Field Level Media
