Ottawa and Philadelphia each will have game in hand afterward, so neither will lose its current spot in the standings. But the Columbus-Detroit winner will be right back in the thick of things after a disappointing stretch. Each will have four games remaining in the regular season.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can\u2019t worry about what other teams do or whoever we have after Detroit,\u201d Werenski said. \u201cOur focus just has to be on Detroit, and after that, we\u2019ll figure it out.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Blue Jackets (38-27-12) were last in the East when they replaced Dean Evason with Rick Bowness as coach Jan. 12. They went on a 19-3-4 run afterward and rose to second in the Metro, but they\u2019ve gone 0-5-1 since.<\/p>\n
After a 2-1 loss to the Winnipeg Jets on Saturday, the players called a meeting.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, I\u2019ll just keep our conversation in here,\u201d Werenski said. \u201cWe\u2019re a better team than what we\u2019ve shown, and we just talked about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Werenski said the players weren\u2019t on the same page and operating as a five-man unit. Bowness pointed to \u201cterrible puck management\u201d and said the players must change their mindset. Stop trying cute plays, turning over the puck and playing on your heels. Start making simple plays, get the puck north and generate offense off the forecheck.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re frustrated, and I get that,\u201d Bowness said. \u201cBut don\u2019t ever think they don\u2019t care, and don\u2019t ever think they\u2019re not trying. They are. We need some better efforts without a doubt, and we\u2019re going to get them. This is a proud group. I\u2019ve said from Day 1 I love working with them. I still believe in them.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Blue Jackets haven\u2019t made the playoffs the past five seasons. Forward Mason Marchment<\/a>\u00a0said they must believe in each other no matter what happens in a game. \u201cTime will tell on that, right?\u201d Bowness said. \u201cSo, here we are. We\u2019re still in it. We\u2019re still in the fight. \u2026 We\u2019ve had plenty of opportunities to help ourselves, and we haven\u2019t. So, is that not handling it well? Well, we\u2019re going to find out, right?\u201d<\/p>\n There is no doubt that the pressure has gotten to the Red Wings.<\/p>\n \u201cIt feels a little heavy, for sure,\u201d Copp said. \u201c\u2026 That\u2019s on us to not let it creep in. In this day and age, it\u2019s pretty hard. We\u2019ve got to channel some fun. We\u2019ve got to channel some jam.\u201d<\/p>\n The Red Wings\u2019 playoff drought sits at nine years, the longest in their 100-year history — and the longest active streak in the NHL now that the Buffalo Sabres have ended their 14-year drought this season. For the third straight season, they\u2019ve stumbled down the stretch. Detroit (40-29-8) was tied with the Carolina Hurricanes for first in the East on Jan. 25 and have gone 8-13-3 since. The Red Wings have been up and down from game to game and within games.<\/p>\n After taking a 1-0 lead in the first period against the Minnesota Wild at Little Caesars Arena on Sunday, they fell behind 4-1 in the second and got booed off the ice at the intermission. They tied it 4-4 in the third, and the rink was rocking again. But after scoring the tying goal, veteran Patrick Kane<\/a> inexplicably stuck out his stick and tripped defenseman Quinn Hughes<\/a> at 16:23. The Wild capitalized with the winner on the power play at 18:09.<\/p>\n \u201cIt hurts,\u201d coach Todd McLellan said. \u201cWe get the comeback, and we take a penalty 150 feet from our net, not even in the play. It hurts.\u201d<\/p>\n Detroit has lost four straight home games in regulation.<\/p>\n Copp talked about not listening to \u201coutside noise\u201d and said it becomes harder to keep an even keel when \u201cconfidence is wavering.\u201d But the Red Wings have created the noise themselves and must be more mentally tough.<\/p>\n \u201cAs soon as it doesn\u2019t go our way, we crumble for a while,\u201d McLellan said. \u201c\u2026 Outside noise, if we\u2019re reading and buying into all of that, then shame on us. \u2026 We orchestrate the energy in the building, if you will. Our play dictates if it\u2019s going to up or if it\u2019s going to come down.\u201d<\/p>\n McLellan compared the Red Wings to a wave.<\/p>\n \u201cWe crest and then crash, crest and then crash,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd it has to change.\u201d<\/p>\n Can the Red Wings crest Tuesday?<\/p>\n Whoever wins, can they ride the wave into the playoffs?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ottawa and Philadelphia each will have game in hand afterward, so neither will lose its current spot in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":544110,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[463,464],"tags":[5,4,60,14,104,718],"class_list":{"0":"post-544109","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl-playoffs","8":"category-stanley-cup-playoffs","9":"tag-hockey","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-nhl-playoffs","12":"tag-stanley-cup","13":"tag-stanley-cup-playoffs","14":"tag-stanley-cup-playoffs-nhl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116359020133284412","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/544109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=544109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/544109\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/544110"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=544109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=544109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=544109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Has the pressure gotten to them? Werenski said no. Bowness left open the question.<\/p>\n