All has been quiet on the trade front for the Red Wings as they rolled into Madison Square Garden to play the tanking New York Rangers. Earlier this morning, the Rangers announced that they had traded Rick Nash to the Boston Bruins for Ryan Spooner and a 1st round pick. Losing an important player like Nash didn’t do much to help them on their six game losing streak as the puck dropped tonight. Detroit won their second in a row as they downed the Rangers in a shootout by a score of 3-2.

The Tatar-Larkin-Athanasiou line was on fire tonight and they got the scoring started late in the first period as AA came streaking into the Rangers zone and fired a shot fivehole past Henrik Lundqvist.

Jimmy Howard, as he does at Madison Square Garden, was fantastic as he turned away 13 Rangers shots in the first period, including this beauty:

Darren Helm added to Detroit’s tally early in the second period when he capitalized on a Rangers turnover at the Red Wings blueline. Helm picked up the puck and went streaking in on a breakaway. What happened next will shock you:

He scored! How often do we get to see a Darren Helm breakaway goal!? What world are we living in!?

The Rangers started to crawl back into it as J.T. Miller wired home a slap shot a few minutes later. Detroit gave him way too much time to wind up and he made no mistake, perfectly placing the puck in the top corner.

Detroit responded with another goal, this time from Tomas Tatar.

Unfortunately, Alain Vigneault deemed it worthy of a challenge and he turned out to be right. The goal was waived off for offside, but, again, that Tatar-Larkin-Athanasiou line was out there making offense happen.

The Wings out-shot the Rangers 11-6 in the second period as they held on to their lead. The Rangers came out hard in the third period, though. They had one goal disallowed that Mats Zuccarello kicked into the net. They did tie it up eventually when Viktor Fast jammed home a rebound into the empty net. Jimmy Howard had been playing a fantastic game, but he can’t stop everything.

Ryan Spooner recorded an assist on the play, which is his first career point as a New York Ranger.

The game went to overtime where the Wings looked pretty lame. They only recorded one shot, but it turned out to be the winner. Very late in the overtime period, Frans Nielsen threw the puck on net and Trevor Daley deflected it out of mid-air. It beat Lundqvist five hole.

 

The Wings played a solid game here. They stayed in it all game, thanks big time to Jimmy Howard, and kept the Rangers on their toes. The third period was almost all New York, but Detroit did a good job of covering themselves defensively. The Wings’ 5v5 Corsi-For percentage of 47.46% is right in line with their season average and proves that they can win hockey games when they play their game. This was their second win in a row and brings them within five points of a wild card spot. They are not out of the playoff picture just yet, despite the looming trade deadline tomorrow.

Tonight’s Motor City MVP is the Syracuse, New York native himself! Howard faced 38 Rangers shots tonight and turned away 36 of them, mostly in spectacular fashion. Every time the Wings roll through MSG, Howie puts on a show. Tonight was no exception. He was instrumental to Detroit staying in this game and sneaking off with the win.

Detroit gets two days off, which is their longest break in between games since February 7th and 8th. They will be on the road for a while though as they travel to St. Louis next for a game against the Blues on Wednesday. Puck drop is at 8:00 P.M. ET.

As always, Brock Seguin will have the pre-game report early Wednesday afternoon.