REPORTS : Red Wings’ Skid: Assessing Playoff Hopes and Future Implications……….

Rangers victory over Avalanche was 3-2. Vancouver was defeated 3-1 by Dallas. Although the Oilers and Golden Knights defeated the Kings and Jets, respectively, with identical 4-1 scoreline, the games’ visual aspects were changed by empty-netters. Heck, the Islanders defeated the Panthers 3-2 in Florida despite being outside the playoff bubble.

Then there was the Red Wings game against the Hurricanes, which ended Detroit’s vital road trip record at 0-2-1 with a 4-0 victory over Carolina.On Thursday, the Red Wings faced a challenge equal to that of any of those teams. They were in the middle of a five-game trip to Carolina, and Patrick Kane was not with them because he was scratched late due to an illness that has been plaguing the Red Wings locker room lately.

But a humiliating defeat, with their backs to the wall? For a squad that was leading the race for a playoff place only a month ago, it’s simply another gut punch in a month full of them.

Some thoughts on where that leaves the Red Wings, both in the playoff race and beyond.

1. It should be noted that Detroit’s players and coaches seemed to feel OK about the first period, despite being outshot 15-3, because the actual scoring chances were much more even. There is merit to that: Natural Stat Trick had the all-situations high-danger chances at just 4-3 in Carolina’s favor in the first period and, remarkably, tied 10-10 at the end of the game.

Just as with Tuesday’s overtime loss in Washington, though, the time for those silver linings has passed. Detroit got nearly every result it needed elsewhere in the league Thursday — the Capitals and Flyers both lost in regulation — so it didn’t lose any ground, but it didn’t make any up, either.

Ben Chiarot said after this latest loss, when asked about the team’s concern level: “I liked (the game in) Nashville a lot, I liked Washington a lot, tonight a little tougher — it’s a top-flight team we’re playing against. I wouldn’t say the concern level is high. We like the way our game is going right now, and we know the goals will come.”

He might be right about that. That’s how close the race is and how up-for-grabs the Eastern Conference’s final playoff spot feels. And I’ve written about the benefits of that chase.

But with each passing game, even if the gap doesn’t widen, it’s getting harder and harder to treat this so-called race as such, when Detroit (and every other team it’s competing with) seems so unable to grab control of it.

2. Where Thursday’s game took a nosedive was in the second period, with two Hurricanes goals in the first six minutes. First, the Red Wings had a blown coverage on a track that left Sebastian Aho wide-open for a backdoor goal, which Derek Lalonde explained as such:

“We duplicated on it. The ‘D’ slid, (Michael Rasmussen) should have took the backdoor guy. So if you can see in the split second — and it happens quick — that’s why you middle-lane drive, but you had Ras and (Jeff Petry) basically covering the driver and leaving the most dangerous guy on the weak side. So, it happens, we’re usually pretty good with tracks. It’s just a misplay. Unfortunately, that’s the goal that got them going.”

After Petry was given a tripping penalty less than a minute later, Carolina scored rapidly through a goal from Seth Jarvis that appeared to freeze James Reimer. It was 4-0 at the end of the period following a Brady Skjei squeaker and a Martin Necas backdoor goal. The game might as well have ended at that point.

“It’s obviously hard to push when you’re down 4-0,” Moritz Seider said. “We still didn’t give up on it. I think that’s a big positive. We stayed together as a team, and maybe that’s something to take away from the game.”

3. Detroit has only scored three goals in its previous three games—all of which came in the team’s defeat to Washington—which is a far cry from the team that spent the majority of the season among the top five scorers in the league. But a lot of people have been saying for the all season that the Red Wings were about to regress. Right now, it’s striking them like a train.

When asked what the Red Wings need to do to pick up a couple of points by the end of this trip — with games remaining in Florida and Tampa Bay — Chiarot answered simply: “Keep doing what we’re doing. We’ve just got to find the back of the net. We’re playing well defensively.”

Detroit has plenty of players who can score. It has 13 players in double digits, including 11 of the 12 forwards it dresses nightly. The question might be, though, are they built to score in these types of games? When they need goals that don’t come on the rush or with plenty of space in the offensive zone?

Those kinds of goals are harder to generate on pure skill or with hard shots from the outside. Two of their three in Washington came right at the top of the crease, but they’ve struggled to find them consistently of late.

4. That speaks to the many questions this Red Wings skid is posing for their future, even beyond whether they get into the playoffs. Detroit has prospects in Marco Kasper and Carter Mazur who have scored those kinds of goals in the past, but both are in the AHL. Can either be expected to be a major solution to the issue in 2024-25? And will two rookies really be the answer to a forward corps that simply must get better defensively?

Or how about in goal, where Reimer may have been put in a bad position on two of the four goals Thursday but was beaten clean on the other two? He’s a free agent, so it’s not all about him, but the reality is the Red Wings have shown this season they need above-average (or better) goaltending to win consistently. That’s what they were getting in January and for much of February, and it’s been a notable area of regression of late.

That doesn’t mean Detroit’s goalies are at fault lately — that blame gets shared by 18 skaters and a coaching staff — but there is nonetheless a reality Detroit is going to have to confront at some point: Whereas teams like Carolina can win despite their goaltending, or when getting average nights in the crease, the Red Wings as currently constructed have been hard pressed to do so.

5.

There is, of course, the blue line. To an absurd extent, Petry has been the favorite scapegoat of the fans. Although he has had many challenges this season, focusing only on him masks a defense corps that is dealing with far more serious problems. Despite being Detroit’s best player and a tremendous skill, Seider currently appears overworked due to an absurd workload that he has had to endure all season. Shayne Gostisbehere has demonstrated a high degree of production, but he must take many risks in order to succeed. Justin Holl has two more years on his contract, but he is a $3.4 million scratch almost every night.

While none of those things are a five-alarm fire, an upgrade is necessary to make them better.

However, seven of Detroit’s eight active defenseman are still under contract or will be under team control come playoff time. Is it feasible for Detroit to reassemble the same team for another round? More importantly, is there really anything that can be done about it?